| name | inventory-thresholds |
| description | Concrete rules for reorder timing, festival stock multipliers, dead-stock identification, low-stock display thresholds, and inventory display caps. Used by inventory-planner every daily run — never decide by feel. |
Inventory Thresholds
All numbers below are tuned for an Indian dropshipping store on a Dropdash supply chain (3-7 day domestic restock, 10-20 day overseas restock). Replace LEAD_DAYS with the SKU's actual restock lead time when computing.
1. Reorder point (RoP)
RoP_units = velocity_per_day × (LEAD_DAYS + safety_days)
safety_days = 3 (default) | 7 (for top-3 SKU by revenue) | 14 (during festival window T-21 to T-7)
When current inventory drops to RoP, flag for reorder.
| SKU class | LEAD_DAYS | safety_days | Effective trigger |
|---|
| IndiaMART (domestic) | 5 | 3 | velocity × 8 days of stock |
| Dropdash partner-stocked | 4 | 3 | velocity × 7 days of stock |
| AliExpress agent | 17 | 3 | velocity × 20 days of stock |
| Local manufacturer | 10 | 3 | velocity × 13 days of stock |
Use the SKU's recorded supplier route (Notion Product Pipeline → Notes URL or supplier metafield).
2. Festival stock multipliers
Apply these BEFORE computing RoP during the festival window. Multiplier applies to forecast velocity, not current velocity.
| Festival | Window applies | Multiplier | Pillar product types affected |
|---|
| Diwali (PEAK) | T-21 to T-3 | 3.0× | Everything; especially gifting, decor, electronics |
| Raksha Bandhan | T-14 to T-3 | 2.0× | Gifting, accessories, beauty |
| Independence Day | T-7 to T-0 | 1.4× | Broad |
| Hariyali Teej / Karwa Chauth | T-14 to T-3 | 2.2× | Apparel, gifting (regional N) |
| Onam | T-14 to T-3 | 2.2× | Regional S |
| Christmas + NYE | T-14 to T-3 | 1.8× | Gifting, gadgets |
| Mother's Day | T-7 to T-0 | 1.5× | Gifting, beauty |
| Bhai Dooj | T-7 to T-0 | 1.6× | Gifting |
| Valentine's | T-14 to T-0 | 1.6× | Gifting, accessories |
For SKUs not in the affected pillar for a given festival, no multiplier is applied — but flag them anyway because spillover demand happens.
Pitru Paksha (Sep, ~16 days, varies by year) — apply a 0.7× multiplier for celebratory products (per the indian-dropshipping skill). Don't reorder during this window unless RoP is breached on its own.
3. Stockout severity bands
| Days of stock remaining | Severity | Action |
|---|
| ≥14 days | 🟢 Healthy | None |
| 8-13 days | 🟡 Reorder soon | inventory-planner flags; ops-planner schedules reorder |
| 4-7 days | 🟠 Reorder now | Operator alert; consider pausing scaling on this SKU |
| 1-3 days | 🔴 Stockout imminent | ads-manager pauses ad sets for this SKU; emergency reorder if possible |
| 0 days (out) | 🚫 Archive product | Set product status to archived (not 0 inventory) to avoid Meta algorithm punishment; flag for reactivation when restocked |
4. Dead-stock identification
A SKU is dead stock if all true:
- 0 sales in last 30 days
- Inventory > 20 units (cost-of-capital threshold)
- Not currently in a planned festival window (a SKU might be intentionally held for an upcoming push)
Action options for dead stock (operator decides):
- Clearance discount: 30-40% off via
ops-planner discount creation, push for 14 days
- Bundle: pair with an active SKU, push as a duo
- Supplier return: if supplier accepts (Dropdash sometimes does)
- Retire: archive product, write killed-product post-mortem
5. Display rules (storefront-side)
| Inventory level | Display behaviour |
|---|
| ≥50 units | Standard "In stock" badge |
| 11-49 units | "In stock" + delivery ETA shown |
| 5-10 units | Show "Only X left" — but only if X is real, never fake urgency |
| 1-4 units | Show "Only X left", elevate ad-set frequency cap to milk last sales |
| 0 units | Product set to archived; not displayed |
Never display inventory above 200 as a hard cap on storefront — caps are visual ("In stock"), not numeric. Numeric inventory >200 in Shopify is fine for backend but should not be exposed to buyers.
6. Inventory cap on Shopify backend
Set realistic numeric inventory in Shopify too. Range: 50-200 units for normal SKUs. Anything outside this range looks fabricated:
- Below 50 — looks like stockout coming, may suppress purchase
- Above 200 — looks fake; the audit caught Vacuum Cleaner at 1,799 (clearly fabricated)
Exception: during festival prep, set to whatever the festival multiplier requires (could legitimately be 500+ for a Diwali peak).
7. Dropdash sync drift detection
Per inventory-planner's daily check:
- For each Dropdash-vendored SKU, compare
updatedAt against the timestamp of our last metafield/tag write (logged in Notion Daily Standup Log if available, else last commit on the harness)
- If
updatedAt > our_last_write AND tags contain DropDash.Entity.Shopify.TagsViewModel → drift confirmed, store-manager re-applies
8. Auto-execute boundary
inventory-planner may execute automatically:
- Flag stockout, reorder-soon, dead-stock to operator
- Compute reorder quantities and dates per skill
- Log inventory snapshots to Notion
inventory-planner must propose and wait for operator approval:
- Archiving a SKU (even if dead-stock)
- Bulk inventory adjustments >5 SKUs at once
- Discount code creation for clearance
- Supplier-return requests
