InventryBookHow to manage stock in a kirana store without counting every day
InventryBook team ·
Why stock goes wrong in a kirana
Most kirana owners know their shop by eye. The trouble starts when the shop grows past what one person can watch: a helper sells the last packet of salt and nobody notes it, a distributor's bill is kept in a drawer, and a carton of a slow biscuit sits for three months.
The result is two kinds of loss. A customer asks for an item you don't have, and buys everything else from the next shop. And money is stuck in stock that isn't moving.
You don't need to count every item every day to fix this. You need three habits.
Habit 1: Write down what comes in, the day it comes in
Every distributor's bill is stock coming in. Note each item and quantity the same day, in a register or an app. If you only record sales, your stock figure drifts away from the shelf within a week.
A simple register has five columns: date, item, came in, went out, left. "Left" is yesterday's left + came in − went out.
Habit 2: Set a "reorder at" number for your fast movers
Pick the 20–30 items that sell every day: oil, atta, sugar, salt, soap, tea, milk packets. For each, decide the number at which you reorder. A simple rule: how many you sell in the days it takes the distributor to deliver, plus a little extra.
Example. You sell about 4 bottles of cooking oil a day, and the distributor comes every 3 days. 4 × 3 = 12, plus 3 extra = reorder at 15. When the shelf has 15, put it on the next order.
You only need this number for fast movers. Slow items can be checked once a week.
Habit 3: Count a few shelves each week, not the whole shop
Counting everything takes a full day, so it never happens. Count one section per week instead (oils and ghee this week, soaps and detergent next week). In a month you have checked the whole shop once.
When the count and the register differ, write down why: damaged, expired, given free, or a missed bill. If it is always the same item, look closer.
Find the items that tie up your money
Once a month, list items that didn't sell at all. If a carton of ₹600 has sat for 60 days, that is ₹600 you could have spent on items that sell daily. Return what the distributor will take back, put the rest near the counter, and don't reorder it.
Doing this on your phone
The same three habits work in a notebook. They are easier on a phone because the app does the arithmetic. In InventryBook, a sale takes the item off stock by itself, and a supplier's bill adds it back, typed or scanned from a photo. On the Stock page each item has a "Warn at" number, and the "Running low" list shows everything that has fallen to it. You can see how stock works for a kirana.
Frequently asked questions
How often should a kirana count stock? Fast movers: glance daily, count weekly. The whole shop: once a month, one section at a time.
What is a good reorder level? Daily sales × days until the next delivery, plus a small buffer. Raise it in festival months.
Do I need software for this? No. A register works if every bill is written the same day. Software helps when you have a helper or more than about 200 items.