WSW E-Commerce Handling Inventory
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Dan DeLong: welcome to another Workshop Wednesdays brought to you by Schoolbookkeeping. com where it's casual conversations for serious workflow. And speaking of casual, look at Rachel, she's just in her casual attire.
Rachel Dauchy: I'm so sorry.
Dan DeLong: That's okay. This is this is why we do these things and and and as needed.
We're fitting this into our busy day and I appreciate you for being able to squeeze us in.
Rachel Dauchy: I've explained to some people before that I am a dance mom also. So I'm always on the road driving my daughter to and from dance.
So this is what's going on today. Just on the go. But my brain is functioning, I promise.
Dan DeLong: Okay. Okay. Yeah, I was a dance mom for a while, but
yeah, I was the schlepper of children to and from [00:01:00] until they turned. 16. And I was like, okay this is great. You get to drive yourself. And then they're like, yeah, I want to quit dance. No! You were driving yourself at least once, too.
Rachel Dauchy: Yeah, I can't imagine that my daughter would quit.
She's probably one of the most dedicated people I've ever met. But I see the senior girls driving themselves to dance in the parking lot. And I'm like, oh, one day.
Dan DeLong: Someday. Okay. So I appreciate you joining us again. Rachel Carrie it's has had another conflict. She does exist. I just want to let you know that we're not just we're not just hiding, Carrie.
She should normally be joining us, but. See, again, had a conflict. So we're continuing our saga of e commerce fundamentals. And we talked to initially about, just what e commerce is. And then we talked about the components of e commerce. And last week we talked about the oh, so exciting topic of sales tax when it comes to e commerce.
And as [00:02:00] equally, I think it's equally on the same plane of. Complications as well as things that cause accountants and bookkeepers to run screaming from e commerce is inventory management. And it really just, it just boils down to, managing the quantities. Buying and selling of stuff Rachel?
Would just to put it in a fundamental term, would you say that's an accurate assessment? Definitely. Or would you say there's more to it than that?
Rachel Dauchy: Yeah, I think that the reason that it, I think quite simply the reason why people like to stay away from it is it's always in flux.
I was just talking about this with one of my clients yesterday. They're always buying stuff, and then they're always selling stuff. There's never a day when there's just stuff sitting. It's always moving. Because of that, it's very dynamic. It, oh, it, the potential to mess it up is there. So I think people like to stay away from it.
Dan DeLong: And do you think it's from an [00:03:00] accounting professional's perspective that want to stay away from it? Or is it more of the business owner themselves? Like they, they have trouble managing their inventory stock levels, or is it more of a, is it sometimes a combination of the two?
Rachel Dauchy: I think it's a combination of the two. I know that sometimes bookkeepers and accountants don't really want to get involved with that. They really only want to record the accounting piece of it and really just stay away from anything more than that. I find that there are some business owners that are really savvy with their inventory.
Oftentimes they have a background in that. And so they really have a grasp on warehouse operations and that kind of thing. Other business owners don't know so much about it. And especially e com sellers, they might be new to the game and not necessarily have a lot of knowledge about that because now it's anybody can sell stuff online.
So I think for those kinds of sellers, there definitely is a learning curve when it comes to knowing what you need to know about inventory. [00:04:00]
Dan DeLong: Yeah. Yeah. I think when, and when it comes down to the general concepts of inventory management we broke it down into prior workshops of just like three major categories.
And I'm going to share that. In the chat, I think okay this should take you to the workshop listing if you're an existing subscriber or member to of School of Bookkeeping you'll be able to access these things. We do have a workshop listing. Free membership, right?
So you can sign up for that and be able to access the prior workshops as well as on our YouTube channel as well, but we have a section about inventory where we did some workshops where we were broke it down into three classifications of inventory management from a business perspective, right?
And so I buy that, I buy some stuff and I sell the same stuff. That is like the easiest form of inventory management. I just buy something
Rachel Dauchy: and resell it. And I usually call those people [00:05:00] resellers.
Dan DeLong: I'm reselling a thing, right? Shirts, apparel, those types of things is a an easy example of that kind of scenario or that, that kind of situation.
Then there is the, the junior varsity version of inventory management, which I buy some stuff, I do something to that stuff, and then I sell. Something else, right? Which could be a combination of some of the stuff that I bought, or maybe I'm making something out of it those are where those Etsy shop owners are going to come in where they typically will make some kind of crafty thing, or it's a bundling or a gift basket, or, some kind of combination of the original stuff that they bought.
So that, that's more of a, you. That adds another complexity to managing the inventory levels because you're turning something into a finished good which is typically different than what you bought, right? [00:06:00] That that been your experience as well in the in the inventory management space?
Rachel Dauchy: Yes. And then what's your third?
Dan DeLong: Oh, the third one is I buy stuff, I put stuff in different places, and I need to know where all of that stuff is at any given time.
Rachel Dauchy: . Yes, definitely. I would also throw in, and this is still very high level, am I doing, Periodic inventory?
Am I doing a perpetual inventory? Or am I not really doing inventory? I'm just Purchasing things and recognizing cost of goods sold right when I buy it. That is for really simple people.
Dan DeLong: Yeah. Let's unpack that there. So you can periodic inventory versus per, perpetual inventory.
Let's talk a little bit and unpack that, those terms. Just so that people get a good understanding of the difference between the two.
Rachel Dauchy: [00:07:00] Yeah. And one of the reasons that I really wanted to say this is because, Yeah. With fundamentals and really understanding the basics of this. You run into these differences all of the time and you really have to understand when you look at a potential client's books to see what they're doing.
And I'll start with what I said was the simplest of simple. This is really for people that don't know much about inventory costing. Or simple businesses where it's totally appropriate to do this. I had one time a client that was like selling they had like wood or logging stuff.
Like wood, I don't know, wood supplies or something. And all of their purchase they just hit cost of goods sold right away. So that, and what that means is that we're [00:08:00] recognizing that expense on the P& L right away. And the trouble that you could run into is that sometimes you're purchasing a lot of stuff, and so you have a very high cost.
In that period. And sometimes it can be even more than your revenue, and so you're expensing a lot of stuff and then it could potentially cause a big loss for you. . And sometimes the tax implication is, and I'm not a tax accountant at all, but sometimes you're going to get a big loss. And so sometimes it can just be upside down.
You don't necessarily want that. And again, it's just a very simple way of doing it. Let's say I'm just selling. Tennis equipment and I go to the tennis equipment warehouse and I'm just buying a whole bunch of tennis equipment and I'm just expensing it right when I purchase it, but I also have it for sale.
That's all that is. I'm not entering something into inventory as an asset. Nothing. So that's hitting costs of goods sold right away. And I, [00:09:00] believe it or not, I see that with a lot of people, even when they shouldn't be doing that. Okay. That's number one. Number two is periodic inventory. And that is when I am buying a whole bunch of materials that I'm putting into inventory, meaning I'm not expensing that cost of goods sold right then.
I'm actually purchasing inventory items and I'm placing it into an inventory account, which is an asset on the balance sheet. Okay, so now I've gone to my, tennis warehouse and I purchased a whole bunch of tennis wear and supplies and tennis rackets and tennis balls and that's sitting in an inventory.
Okay, so now if I have a tennis shop or an online store, I'm not, I don't have the resources or the staff or the time. to constantly count that inventory and do what's called a [00:10:00] perpetual inventory. So I'm going to do a periodic inventory. And what that means is I'm not even going to necessarily keep track of it as I sell it.
I'm going to take one count right when I buy it. And usually it's whatever is arrives is what you have. You don't necessarily need to do a count. Then I'm going to At either once a quarter, once a year, once every maybe six months, or once a year, I'm going to take another count and presumably I've bought some more stuff, I've sold a whole bunch more stuff, and then I'm just going to record that difference in that count.
To cost of goods sold. So that's when I'm recognizing the cost of goods sold. And I'm not really necessarily concerned with knowing what my inventory is after every single sale. Now, then the third one is called a perpetual inventory, and that's when we know our inventory [00:11:00] after every single sale.
And so the, what happens with that is we expense that little bit of cost of goods sold that's associated with that one item, which we've preloaded into the software, and so that little bit of cost of goods sold gets recognized with each individual sale, and then my inventory is adjusted with every single sale.
Every single sale adjusts my inventory, every purchase adjusts my inventory, but I always know what that inventory is because I'm keeping track of that inventory on a perpetual basis, meaning after every sales transaction. I am aware of what my inventory is. And that's not to say you shouldn't go in and still count it because things fall off the back of a truck or things get crushed in the warehouse and there's always breakage, loss, yeah.
And so you still always still want to count, but but in my [00:12:00] experience, there's always differences just because of that but you still have a general sense of what your inventory is because. You're keeping track of it perpetually in your inventory management software.
Dan DeLong: It's counting your calories every day rather than just every, at the end of every month.
Stepping on the scale and wondering yeah. That was a good month or?
Rachel Dauchy: Yeah and for e commerce. Yeah, exactly. And e commerce sellers, you really want a perpetual inventory. Why do you think that would be, Dan?
Dan DeLong: Yeah. So that's, that was my question. Now for an e commerce, what would be best?
I can imagine, especially if you're selling in multiple places if you're a brick and mortar store and you're also selling that stuff online, you would want to know where, what levels that you have so that you don't sell out of something on any given day.
So if an order comes in from the website, and then somebody goes to fulfill it and, oh my goodness I do not have it [00:13:00] available to, to sell. Now I've got a, now I've got a customer service issue where now I need to talk to the customer and, let them know it's on back order or give them an idea of when that's coming in all of those things.
Would you agree with that? Yeah,
Rachel Dauchy: definitely. And some marketplaces such as Amazon and Walmart marketplaces have rules and regulations you can't have out of stocks. Now, you can be, you can have stuff on backorder and as long as you're communicating that with them, but if it's showing that you have stock and then they purchase it, And then it turns out you don't have it, you really have out of stocks, you're violating your agreement with them.
So you have to be really careful about that. So you want to make sure that you have one inventory hub that's accurately counted and tracked perpetually, and then that can push out those levels to your various Right. Marketplaces and platforms in that way, it's accurate.
Dan DeLong: Alright, so now we've determined that [00:14:00] for an e commerce seller, it makes sense to do a perpetual inventory, basically knowing the status of your inventory at any given time.
So then it becomes a matter of where do you manage that, right?
Where's the inventory at any given time? We determined that's the best option then for any commerce seller then the big question is determining where are they going to be tracking that perpetual inventory, right? What is going to be their.
Their source of truth, right? Which would now that we've determined from before, okay, they've got a sales channel, they've got some bridge between and they've got their QuickBooks, right? So either end of the spectrum is going to be a place to manage that, right? If you do it on the sales channel.
That's where you got to live. That's right. That's where you got to live with those. Does the sales channel or does the the, this is a question now to answer. Does the sales channel allow for the [00:15:00] proper management of your inventory as far as ordering receiving, calculating costs, those types of things inside of inside of that package or Does it not, right?
So then that sort of thing is going to be then now. Okay. I need another way to manage that. Maybe it's in my QuickBooks. Now when we talk about So let's just talk about that before we, we go into, the other caveat of maybe introducing another app into this equation, but what have you found has been with your clients the better option, right?
So as far as I'm going to track it inside QuickBooks, or I'm going to track it inside of my sales channel. Where do they tend to tend to live for that? And why? This is a weighted question.
Rachel Dauchy: But it's also a really good question. Probably the most important question. Yeah. The most.
I exclusively work in QuickBooks Online, [00:16:00] so all of my answers are coming from the perspective of QuickBooks Online. I'm an Advanced Pro Advisor for QuickBooks Online, and so although there is an inventory function in QuickBooks Online, it does have some limitations, but if, A business owner falls within the realm of these limitations.
They can absolutely use it.
Dan DeLong: And we had talked about the different complexities. It's the first one where I buy the stuff exactly
Rachel Dauchy: So they are resellers So resellers can use it because you it is really made for buying inventory and reselling inventory It's not meant for any kind of manufacturing or any kind of assembly.
It's not, it doesn't have that capability. However, if you are reselling, you can resell individual items or you can bundle them. And you can do that in QuickBooks Online, and you can push the bundle levels to one channel. And notice I said one channel. You can't do more than [00:17:00] one channel. So let's say for instance, I am connecting my QuickBooks Online inventory with Etsy.
Or, let's not say Etsy. Let's say Shopify. Then, if I'm only connecting to Shopify, then it's going to push my inventory levels there just fine. But the problem is it gets confused if you try and connect in more than one channel. You can't do that. At that point, we really want to utilize an external inventory management system that we can then Turn off inventory in QuickBooks.
And by the way, in order to use the inventory function in QuickBooks, you do have to be using Plus or Advanced. You can't do it in Simple Start, Essentials so in, in QuickBooks Online, you would have to disable that and then you would move [00:18:00] your inventory items into an external cloud based inventory app, which there are many.
And like you had also alluded, that sometimes the marketplaces and platforms do have their own. Inventory management solution they do, they're usually very limited. I there, I wouldn't use something like that because then they limit you to only in that platform or in that marketplace.
So in my experience, it's better to be with a neutral. inventory hub and then that way you can just connect in the marketplaces and the platforms that you want and you have one hub and it sends your levels to all of those platforms and all of those different platforms and marketplaces, they don't get confused.
So you have one amount that is pushing to all those levels and then it's sending valuation back to QuickBooks, so QuickBooks is super [00:19:00] important in the process, but it's really just collecting all of your, the value of that inventory, so it's decreasing when you're selling, so it's communicating the sales to QuickBooks that your inventory is decreasing, and then when you're making purchases with those inventory hubs, you're sending The purchase orders usually turn into bills, and then they send that to QuickBooks, and then so then your inventory increases on the balance sheet with said POs.
So that's so in QuickBooks, you're having a value that's always dynamic, increasing, decreasing, increasing, decreasing, but you're not managing those actual items in there. And I, my clients get confused with that. All the time.
Dan DeLong: Yeah, so That is that's a great point it's as we're determining like where are we living for inventory management?
the there are [00:20:00] a Combination of workflows that go into the inventory management piece of that, that to your point, if you're managing all of that in Shopify, for example and does it actually do purchase order? Can you submit a purchase order for inventory? Out of Shopify to your suppliers.
I don't know. Not
Rachel Dauchy: in Shopify, but if you utilize a Inventory management app in the Shopify app store like stocky. Yes, you can though and then those just Update your levels in Shopify, but then guess what? I have clients that come to me and say Oh, but then now I want to sell on Amazon. So we got to take that inventory out of that and then put it in a hub that can connect into both.
So that's a little bit of an issue that I'm finding now that I'm getting so much more into the nitty gritty with all of this different stuff is you really need an inventory hub [00:21:00] and, and especially if you're manufacturing, you have to. So they really think that you can go platform to platform, but you need to have a hub.
And then that goes to platform to marketplace. To me, it's really important to have that hub.
Dan DeLong: Yeah, cause cause they'll the apps and the solutions that are out there will just say, yeah, it'll send it to QuickBooks or yeah, it'll work with this and the devil's always in the details.
Rachel Dauchy: Yes, that's such an interesting thing you say because they always say, it makes it such a snap. It syncs, syncs with QuickBooks. Okay. But you have to understand what. You want sending to QuickBooks, not just sends it. You have to know what you want to go there.
Dan DeLong: One of my first clients in the e commerce space was using an application called EcomDash.
Never heard of it before, learned a lot about it. And of course it said, it syncs with QuickBooks, [00:22:00] right? And it was really the main workflows that he was using it for was ordering and list publishing his listings on Shopify and Amazon, right? So he could do listings in one place and then they could feed out into both places.
And then. It could then calculate his landed cost, and we'll talk a little bit about that and that sort of thing, but the synchronization to QuickBooks was only for, it would send a purchase order over to QuickBooks without any, Items. So when you look at that, I was like, Oh, this is useless because he's tracking his inventory over here.
And then we were trying to use QuickBooks as a source of truth for his inventory management level because he was doing what you would just talk about with with the. The I accounted for all of my purchases at the time that I purchased it. So I'm like, you gotta get out of that.
You gotta be in a, you're wondering to know your perpetual inventory, but then you're accounting for it all when you purchase it? No, doesn't [00:23:00] work that way. Yeah. Can't have cake and eat it too in when it comes to when it comes to inventory tracking.
Rachel Dauchy: Yeah, and you also if the POs are coming over and you're managing your inventory in QuickBooks and you're using those product service items as inventory items, the purchase order has to have the items so you can add a hundred more widgets into your inventory.
The difference would be if you have turned off that inventory function and your product service items are essentially. Service items only. It'll send the P. O. as a bill and most of them now are quite sophisticated and it'll still say I'm purchasing. 6 widgets, but it's a product service item that is not tied to an inventory value.
It's just increasing inventory. That's all. We're not... It's hard to explain, but all I'm going to say is we're [00:24:00] just increasing the value of our inventory when we have a bill like that. It's that's launching into a whole other discussion about product service items and QuickBooks that we don't need to do but, because, but that is an important piece of it, is really understanding product service items in QuickBooks.
Man, there's a lot to know.
Dan DeLong: You can't well, and that's really the goal of what we're trying to drive home here is that you can't co mingle or have have this inventory management split across the different apps You have one one source of truth and that's the turn and you know with your client conversations understanding where that source of truth is going to be Right, so it's either going to be in the sales channel But there are things you're eliminating out of the workflows of a QuickBooks by doing so, right?
And so if you're... If you live in QuickBooks and live, breathe and work in QuickBooks of all the things that you are going to be, the workflows that you're gonna have your client or yourself doing and they're living somewhere else, [00:25:00] then that's going to be, a changing of your engagement, right?
So either you're gonna have to be familiar with that, or you're gonna have to deal with the consequences of. Maybe not knowing what's going on with some of those things and just letting the chips fall where they may when that happens to come in or another. There's another way of communicating those things and getting that QuickBooks reality to match what happened in, in
Rachel Dauchy: reality
Dan DeLong: with a with a, with the reseller.
So we'll just use this example of a reseller where I buy stuff, I sell stuff and they're selling on multiple sales teams, Amazon, Etsy, what I tend to What I tend to recommend is, yes, go ahead and manage all, manage the inventory levels in QuickBooks because you can do that, but then that now tells me that what bridge I'm using between the two the sales channel, all the sales channels in QuickBooks I [00:26:00] would recommend like a Webgility, right?
Because a Webgility allows for that's one of the things I really like about the, that particular channel. Connector is that it does allow for the man, the the decrement of QuickBooks the SKU or the item in QuickBooks, and then it immediately goes back out and updates the inventory levels in the other
Rachel Dauchy: channel.
Oh, that's awesome. I didn't realize WebGility did that. So WebGility then acts as that hub that communicates to all the levels. Exactly. So it reads it and it goes. Okay, Amazon and Shopify and blah blah blah. I now have five of those not six. Exactly.
Dan DeLong: Oh, that's really cool. So if you sell something on Amazon, Shopify ultimately knows about it.
If you sell something on Shopify, Amazon knows about it. So in that
Rachel Dauchy: situation, you can manage it in QuickBooks and then do your levels. Okay, so that's great.
Dan DeLong: But, and then that way you're [00:27:00] focusing, what, in QuickBooks and you'll be able to manage the purchasing and the receiving and the selling will come in because of the bridge.
And then you're also managing the, it's allowing it to manage the inventory stock levels on those sales. That is, a delicate situation, right? So typically what happens is And you could probably attest to the clients add more things, right? Yeah. They change their listing or they create custom items or something in the Shopify, for example, and now QuickBooks does.
Nothing about that. And so subsequently neither does Amazon. And
Rachel Dauchy: then potentially break all what you, the rule is if I have a in one place, it's gotta be in the other place. Otherwise it will not communicate. So then they'll add a whole bunch of items in here and then they won't be added here and then they'll never come through with sales.
So yeah that's risky. And I don't love that. And I love that when I'm training them, here's the one [00:28:00] hub. New items go in here, period, end of story. Then they get pushed up to wherever. But they still have to be created on the platform side, too. But, yeah it's, it, there's just a lot of different moving parts.
And then don't forget that situation with Webgility, that's only for resellers. So when it's appropriate for them to do their inventory. Exactly.
Dan DeLong: So that leads me to my next comment of, okay when it's not a reseller type of situation where it's, I buy stuff and I sell the same stuff. And I just need to manage the levels, right?
Then you're introducing, okay, I can't, and this is, and I've got multiple sales channels, potentially I need something else to manage my inventory and understanding that's where I'm going to be living for my inventory. And then those sales channels are going to be feeding into that. And then that's going to be what's talking to, what's talking to QuickBooks.
So understanding where the work is going to lie in now. Three [00:29:00] things or three or four things, right? You could basically be having three different applications, three or four different applications here but what you when you're looking at a, an inventory management cloud based application they're not all created equal either, right?
The common ones and the ones that you're mostly familiar with, right? They're the Katanas of the world and the SOS inventories and and the Sin 7 core, right? Those are the more common ones that I've heard of as
Rachel Dauchy: well. There's a few others out there that I know I've definitely talked to them at conferences Katana, I really like.
It's cloud based. One of the reasons I really like it is because it's very cost effective and it's also, the interface is very simple to use and understand. The training is also quite simple, but something like that is perfect for manufacturers because it has just a really easy to understand interface.
The connectivity is really great. It integrates with [00:30:00] everything. It also integrates the shipping. Platforms such as ShipStation or Shipbo, so that way when you have shipped items and updates or inventory that way. I also have used SOS Inventory, which is good. The interface is a little more difficult for me to understand, but I have used it before.
I like it. Since I've been core, it was formerly deer inventory. There that's a really complex system to use, but it is amazing. And they also have all kinds of different integrations like with. SPS, EDI for S, like SPS commerce EDI, to, it's electronic data interchange, which you need for to fulfill chain stores.
They only accept orders through EDI. And so if you don't have that ability, then you can't do business with them. So Katana doesn't have anything like that, but [00:31:00] the Syn7 core does. So if you've got those needs. And not only that, SYN7 also has Omni, which is if you have a client that has even more enterprise level needs.
So there are all kinds of different solutions out there, and all of them have different kinds of integrations, different kinds of inventory costings, different kinds of. Fancy landed cost allocations and but for simple manufacturers for example, I just got a client the other day that manufactures clothing and like a specific sports clothing where and she buys fabric and she manufactures this clothing, this athletic clothing where and.
I don't know, maybe has 15 SKUs, but, definitely manufactures, and so we need to keep track of that cost, and Katana is perfect for her, because we have a pretty simple manufacturing operation, but it, [00:32:00] we are able you. See everything very clearly and simply and she was able to pick it up in a day.
So something like that is a really great thing to use because she's selling on one sales platform and wants to sell on more. So we have got, we set it up where. She's getting all of her items loaded into Katana and we're plugging in Shopify, but then she wants to be able to sell on other platforms to come and scale up.
So that's why another reason these hubs are really great is because. They really help these clients do the correct thing from the beginning, and then they can scale up very easily.
Dan DeLong: So that's that's another thing to to consider in, right? If you're, when we had talked about the different components of you've got your sales channels, you've got some bridge between between that sales channel, and then ultimately your accounting source of truth, which would be, in this case, your QuickBooks.
The, if you are introducing a more [00:33:00] robust inventory management piece. You also want to make sure that those that inventory management component now takes the place of the bridge between the two, right? So if you're, if at first you were doing a WebDuality type of thing where it just sits between the sales channels and QuickBooks as your source of truth, then now WebDuality just goes by the wayside because you want to.
Make sure that your inventory management component is the one that's doing the talking to the sales channels. Is that what you've you've come across?
Rachel Dauchy: Yes, definitely. And not only that because I am quite involved in inventory and how these platforms work as a. QuickBooks ProAdvisor.
We've been listening to this for years now about advisory and that kind of thing. For me, my advisory really comes into this. And I know that there are some other e commerce bookkeepers and accountants that really just [00:34:00] want to record the the transactions and that's really all they want to look at and they don't really want to get involved in the inventory.
Maybe they don't know how. But there's definitely a community out there where we're all really supportive of each other, where we do get involved in that inventory and want to learn as much as we can and be advisors to our clients in this space. And being able to understand these differences with all these different platforms is, It's really important and as a bookkeeper and accountant, I can definitely increase my price point because, this is a lot more intricate.
So like you said, going from a platform like, or a connector like Webgility into something like Katana or SYN7 where now, what if my client doesn't even understand how to use something like this now with. my expertise and understanding how to navigate around Katana and, with understanding how [00:35:00] inventory works, I can get more involved with that with them and become even that much more of an advisor.
So there is room for pro advisors, people working in QuickBooks Online with clients that have inventory. To get involved in this, and there's Organizations such as Woodard that's really supportive with that, And very encouraging for us to get folks out of desktop And into these cloud based platforms.
Dan DeLong: And that brings up another, thing, right? If your source of truth is desktop and you're using maybe an enterprise, how does that impact your your workflows in, in, in QuickBooks versus how do I get my data into those things? Because you could feasibly be doing your inventory management.
Cause that, that does allow for greater inventory management in when you're using like an enterprise platform or something like that. But. Have you found with the different inventory, cloud based [00:36:00] inventory applications that their integrations with a Shopify is would you be giving up something by going with with sin seven core, for example, or Katana, as far as giving getting the integration from Shopify or Amazon, is it any better or worse from one over the other?
Yeah.
Rachel Dauchy: Do you understand my question? I do. I don't know that I'm qualified enough to answer that question. I have not had a problem with the integration, and by that I just mean let's say I make a change in the inventory platform, and I say, Oh, okay, I'm making a A change I'm from 100 to 75 and then I look in Shopify and has that been updated?
Yes instantly So I find that the connection is quick as far as Levels, but I don't know if you're asking me something else than that[00:37:00]
Dan DeLong: As far as because like I know What's going to happen from Shopify through WebDuality into QuickBooks. I know how that integration is going to work.
I can go into QuickBooks or or WebDuality settings and make sure that whatever happens over in Shopify shows up the way I expected it to in QuickBooks. If I'm now eliminating one of that middleman app in lieu of a an inventory management app, because. I have more robust inventory needs, and that's the one that's connecting to, to Shopify.
Do, would you, would, have you found that is, that's okay, right? Like that particular connection. Connection is okay. Like you're not Yeah.
Rachel Dauchy: Oh, yes. Yes. Yeah. That, that, now the more fancy. And pricey, the app is, the better the accounting, the better the accounting settings you'll have, and so you can map to really [00:38:00] anything.
Some of them that are a little more low cost have very limited accounting but they're working on, say for instance Katana they're definitely working on that. They're increasing the accounting capability and GL accounts that you can choose from on the Katana side. But and adding, some other things such as landed cost with something like sin seven, which is formerly deer.
Oh, the accounting functions in that are incredible. I actually went to the deer implementation training and. Denver and they demoed that and it was incredible. It was really, I could customize anything I want with the accounting.
Dan DeLong: That's good. Good to know. And so that's great to know.
And I think I think we'll coming in for a landing on our landing cost of of our inventory discussion here. Now some of the other things that we're going to be chatting about and things that we've alluded to is fulfillment, right? That's, that is a. That is a definite [00:39:00] concern of how do I get stuff now that I've got an order?
How do I get stuff to and communicate that with the customer? So join us next week when we when we discuss yet another topic of the e commerce fundamentals We appreciate you joining us this week and and we'll see you next time on the workshop wednesday
