Planning apparel inventory across styles, colors, and sizes

The operating problem

Apparel planning becomes unreliable when the sales plan, assortment, SKU master, and open purchase orders use different definitions. A style can look healthy in aggregate while important colors or sizes are unavailable. Planners also need to distinguish a change in overall order volume from a change in product preference.

What we built

Our work connected spreadsheet-based inventory planning with an operating portal for products, purchasing, sales forecasts, and inventory position. The product model separates styles, colorways, and SKUs so each decision uses the appropriate level of detail.

The forecasting workflow models product demand relative to total ecommerce order volume, applies supported seasonal patterns, and combines the result with an order-volume scenario. Product selectors, actual-versus-forecast charts, current-month updates, and CSV exports make the assumptions reviewable. Shopify inventory snapshots add available, committed, incoming, and preorder context; purchasing remains a separate operational source rather than an assumed extension of Shopify. This assortment forecast holds the current selling assortment constant; future collection launches are a separate planning problem.

What the work enables

The resulting workflow gives planners a clearer path from commercial expectations to inventory review and purchase-order decisions. It supports both the established spreadsheet process and the newer portal, with visible boundaries around missing or incomplete inputs. The work demonstrates planning implementation, not a promise that every recommendation automatically becomes a supplier order.