Inventory management for a Shopify baby products store
If you sell baby and kids products on Shopify, inventory management is really a size-curve problem: the 0 to 3 month sleepsuit empties while the 4 to 5 year sits. Restoc watches stock and sales per SKU, works out a reorder point from your own velocity and lead time, and tells you before a size runs out.
How a baby and kids catalogue gets watched today
Inventory for a baby and kids store usually lives in two places. The inventory list in your Shopify admin, which tells you what is on hand right now, and a spreadsheet you rebuild every few weeks, which tries to work out what that number means. The second question is the harder one, and it is the one that gets skipped when a shipment is late and the inbox is full.
The common routine looks like this:
- Sort the admin inventory list by quantity, low to high, and scan the top of it.
- Decide from memory which of those SKUs have a long factory wait and which can be topped up quickly.
- Set a single low-stock number for everything, so a fast-moving newborn size and a slow 4 to 5 year size get judged by the same threshold.
- Open the spreadsheet on a Sunday night, paste in a sales export, and guess at weeks of cover.
It works until the catalogue grows. A style in six sizes and two colourways is twelve lines, not one, and a parent who needs 6 to 12 months today will not take 18 to 24 months instead. Running out of a single size reads to that shopper as a product you do not sell, and that is a real financial hit, not a rounding error.
Where the baby and kids catalogue makes it hard
The size and age curve multiplies the SKUs
One design becomes a grid. Newborn, 0 to 3, 3 to 6, 6 to 12, 12 to 18, 2T, 3T. Demand is never flat across that grid, and the shape of it moves as a season goes on, because repeat buyers come back for the next size up. The style total can look healthy while the two sizes that actually sell are already at the bottom.
Demand arrives in gifts
Baby showers, registries, birthdays and Christmas pull buying towards a handful of giftable items. A toy, a blanket, a keepsake set. Those are the SKUs where running out hurts most, and they are often the ones with the longest wait behind them.
Lead times are long and not very flexible
Textile runs, wooden goods and printed items are ordered in batches, often from one factory. If your paperwork and testing documentation sit with that supplier, swapping to another one mid-season is rarely quick. That means the only lever you have is noticing early, which is a timing problem rather than a sourcing problem.
Consumables and replenishment items are unforgiving
The lines parents re-buy on a cycle drain steadily rather than in spikes. Steady drain is exactly what a weekly eyeball misses, because nothing about the number looks dramatic until the day it hits zero.
How Restoc watches a baby and kids catalogue
- Connect the store
Install through Shopify OAuth. Restoc pulls inventory levels and sales history through webhooks plus a scheduled sync job, so your stock and your sales both come from the store itself. It is a web app: there is no mobile app and no browser extension.
- Enter the lead time per SKU
The number of days between placing an order and having it on the shelf, as you actually experience it. Ninety days for an overseas toy run and seven days for a locally printed card are different businesses, and Restoc treats them as different numbers because you type both.
- Pick a sales velocity window
Seven, fourteen or thirty days, store-wide. A short window follows a gifting surge quickly. A thirty-day window steadies a size that sells in ones and twos. Pro adds a per-SKU override, which is the one to reach for when a hero gift SKU behaves nothing like the rest of the grid.
- Read the dashboard
Current stock, days of inventory remaining and reorder status for every active SKU. Each size is its own row, so 6 to 12 months is judged on its own velocity rather than being hidden inside the style.
- Take the alert
When a SKU crosses its reorder point, Restoc sends an email. On Growth and above it also posts to a Slack webhook, so the person who raises supplier orders sees it in the channel they already sit in. Delivery runs through an idempotent background job, so one crossing is one alert, not a stream of them.
- Order from the weekly report
Once a week, a report lists every SKU below its reorder point with a suggested order quantity. View it in the app or export the CSV, and build the factory order from that instead of from a rebuilt spreadsheet.
What this changes for a baby and kids brand
Every size stands on its own
Reorder status is per active SKU, so a sold-through newborn size cannot hide behind a well-stocked 3T. The grid is visible as a grid.
Days of inventory remaining, not just a quantity
Forty units means nothing on its own. Forty units with eleven days of cover and a sixty-day factory wait is a decision you need to make today.
The long lead time is built into the warning
The reorder point is calculated from your velocity window and the lead time you entered per SKU, so the SKU that takes a quarter to arrive warns you a quarter out.
Alerts land where the ordering happens
Email on every plan. Slack on Growth and above, through an incoming webhook you configure, so a shared buying channel gets the same notice you do.
One alert per crossing
The alert job is idempotent. A SKU that crosses its reorder point does not fill your inbox with repeats, which is what makes it safe to leave switched on.
A buying list you can send on
The weekly reorder report carries a suggested order quantity per SKU and exports as CSV, which is a straightforward basis for a supplier order or a sheet your manufacturer wants.
Room for the grid to grow
Tracked SKU caps are 200 on Starter, 1,000 on Growth and 2,000 on Pro, enforced at sync time. A size and colour grid adds up fast, so pick the tier by the number of variants, not the number of designs.
What Restoc answers, and what it does not
| The question | Restoc today |
|---|---|
| Which sizes are close to running out | Current stock, days of inventory remaining and reorder status per active SKU, on the dashboard |
| When a SKU crosses its reorder point | An email alert, plus a Slack webhook post on Growth and above |
| How much to order this week | The weekly reorder report lists SKUs below their reorder point with a suggested order quantity, in app and as CSV |
| How big the next gift season will be | Not forecast. The reorder point uses your measured sales velocity over 7, 14 or 30 days and the lead time you enter |
| Stock split across a shop and a warehouse | Not yet. Every plan covers one location |
| Raising the purchase order with the supplier | Not in the app. The report and its CSV are what you order from |
| Checking stock from a phone | Restoc is a web app. The alerts are what reach you away from the desk, by email or Slack |
Questions
Does it treat each size and colourway as its own SKU?
Yes. The dashboard shows current stock, days of inventory remaining and reorder status for every active SKU, so each size and colour variant gets its own reorder point and its own alert.
Can I set a different lead time for an overseas toy run and a local reprint?
Yes. Lead time is a number you enter per SKU, and the reorder point calculation uses it alongside your chosen sales velocity window of 7, 14 or 30 days.
Will it predict my baby shower and Christmas peaks?
No. Restoc does not forecast seasonality. It measures the sales velocity your store actually recorded over the window you choose, and warns when a SKU crosses the reorder point that velocity and your lead time imply. If you want faster reaction during a gifting surge, a 7-day window follows recent sales more closely.
How do the alerts reach me?
By email on every plan, from the moment you connect a store. On Growth and above, alerts also post to a Slack incoming webhook you configure. Delivery runs through an idempotent background job, so one threshold crossing produces one alert per channel.
My catalogue is mostly variants. Which plan do I need?
Count variants, not designs. Starter tracks up to 200 SKUs at $29 a month, Growth up to 1,000 at $59, and Pro up to 2,000 at $99, with yearly billing at ten months' price for twelve. The caps are enforced at sync time, and Slack alerts start on Growth.
Does it handle stock in a second location or a 3PL?
Not yet. Every plan covers one location today. We will say so here when that changes rather than leave it implied.
Can it place the reorder with my supplier?
No. Restoc stops at telling you what to order and roughly how much: the weekly report lists each SKU below its reorder point with a suggested order quantity, viewable in the app and exportable as CSV. Raising the order stays with you.
How is it billed?
Through Shopify, on your Shopify invoice, rather than as a separate card payment. The 60-day free trial runs first, and the first charge is held until at least one full weekly reorder cycle has completed.