Feature Request: Sync inventory across multiple locations

[crystalimages]

The title of this post has been edited from the original: Multi-Location Inventory - All locations use same inventory

Is there a way to have multiple locations use the same inventory? We sell orders from several locations and need to track by location, but the inventory comes from the same stock. Aside from assigning a certain amount of inventory to each location, and likely having to shuffle the inventory around within square, and possibly thinking we are out and ordering more when there's plenty in the inventory of another location... Can certain items be assigned from a central inventory stock and other items be location specific? 

I'm not seeing this is possible now, but is it something being considered? 

I'm using Square POS, not retail. I believe retail has a more robust inventory system, but retail is just far more in general than we need.

[cwilliams112]

We also have a farm serving multiple locations with pre-orders due to COVID-19, and are looking to draw inventory for those locations from one pool.

We attend three farmers markets a week, and do on-farm pick up. We'll be allowing customers to pre-order using square this year but oh man is it going to be ugly. I've talked with other farms that are in the same boat. Because of the inability to manage inventory cohesively, I have to set the location of the store to one place, and am writing in caps all over everything that they HAVE to specify where they're picking up in the notes to seller. Additionally, we'll have to close orders early in the week (accepting orders Mon or Tues - Weds) since our first location's delivery is on Thursday and we need a day to harvest/pack orders. Unfortunately that means that customers at our Saturday location will have to have their orders in by Wednesday too, which is kind of ridiculous but the best we can come up with. (I could theorhetically leave the store up with a note that orders for XYZ market must be in by XX, but I don't trust people to read and follow directions and don't want lots of bummed customers who need refunds on my hands.) All this could be solved with the capacity to manage inventory across multiple locations!!! Then I could set my inventory, the actual hours of the locations, and the lead time needed for orders at that location and I think I'd be set. So many problems solved! I hope this feature gets released soon. (And I hope they come out with a bluetooth scale that's not like $700, but that's another conversation, int he mean time I'm grateful that prices by weight are finally a thing!) 

[Alex_]

@cwilliams112,

Thank you so much for the feedback. We really appreciate it. Please know we take the voice of our sellers into account when rolling out new features and products, so we will be sure to let you know if anything changes.

[therollingpin]

I would also like to see this feature added. I would like to have an inventory "pool" that will keep track of both of my pick up locations. 

[Dancinggnome]

@SGFarm did this API system work for you, or did you find another workaround? I'm in exactly the same boat, and it's really frustrating for my customers when they get to the checkout and their pickup location is not an option. Then they text or email me, which sends me scrambling in the field to pull inventory off one pickup location and add it to another. I'm worried that there's also a group of folks that hit a snag in ordering and then just give up because it's too much of a headache.

All l need is to be able to update the total number of carrot bunches that I have--I don't care which pickup location folks choose.

I'm new to APIs--would this proposed solution essentially be programming an automatic process that would adjust our inventory across all pickup locations after each order is placed?

Thanks for your help! Overall the platform works smoothly and looks great--it's just this one issue that is causing an unnecessary amount of fiddling for me and an unnecessary level of confusion for my customers.

[crystalimages]

From what I gather from your situation, it might be useful to add a modifier to your items that requires them to select a location for pickup. I know this will likely affect your normal work flow, but during the current situation it might be worth the effort. You can create a single modifier and add it to multiple items just by selecting them from a list. So you wouldn't have to create one for each item. 

I didn't gather from your post if you're using the online store or not, but you could do the same for that as you can for the tablet app.

[cwilliams112]

I’m using the online store. It might work for some businesses with just a couple items. It would be more of a pain for our customers to have to specify in every single seedling or produce item the location they’re going to pick it up. That would be easier on our end since the formatting would be uniform for export, as long as they actually picked the same location for every item. However I’m not willing to make my best customers click the same box 20+ times an order. They would be annoyed, I know I would.

[AshleyK]

Hi @Dancinggnome. You can definitely use the inventory API and just call RetrieveInventoryCount for a particular item variation, and it will return the count for each location (so you just add it up programmatically).

Check out the details here.

[HappyValleyFarm]

Hi @ashc  It's been a couple of months - any updates on allowing multiple locations to share one inventory?

[ashc]

@HappyValleyFarm We'll be sure to update the thread if anything changes!

[blueheronmarket]

I would like to see if there's a way to make individual menus have set times to be available to pick up. I.e. Breakfast menu to be set from 9am-12pm, Dinner menu from 4pm-7pm. But I want guests to be able to pre order and set the hours they would like to pick up.

Currently it's only allowing me to have them order during said times. Or they can preorder and pick up during an hours were open. 

Does anyone know of a way to achieve what I am trying. Or whom I can contact to try and get this feature added?

Thank you.