Rollout: where to start

Stockly does not start from a blank page. By the time it is installed, the shop already has stock figures, open orders and, very often, location codes kept in some product field. Rolling out means moving that knowledge into the module without stopping sales and without one big day of counting everything.

Two routes

A fresh shop — the catalogue exists, sales do not. The wizard is enough: link the catalogue, create a warehouse and its bin locations. See Initial setup; this page becomes relevant when a second building appears.

A shop that already sells — this section. Three things are added that a fresh shop never has: goods already issued to orders placed before the start, locations kept outside the module, and stock split across more than one building.

The order that works

The order is not arbitrary: each step uses what the previous one did.

1. Install and link the catalogue. Every product gets a stock record in the default warehouse and orders start creating movements. → A shop that already sells
2. Orders open before the start. Their goods left stock before the module started counting, so they have to be given back together with their demand. → same page, the Open orders step
3. Location mapping. Codes from a product field become bin locations and stock lands on the right shelves. → Location mapping
4. An opening count for the second building. If goods sit in two places while the module sees one warehouse, the second one is carved out by counting it. → Opening count
5. A first verification stocktake. Only now does each building’s book stock mean something physical and deserve checking. → First stocktake

Caution

Steps 3 and 4 happen in that order. Mapping spreads stock across the shelves of one building, the one whose codes sit in the product field. The opening count then carves the second building out of it. The other way round means placing goods on shelves they are about to leave.

What a rollout does not need

• Closing the shop. Every step is done with sales running.
• Counting everything in one day. An opening count is done section by section, over a week if need be; uncounted goods stay where they are and nothing happens to them.
• Retyping stock figures. There is no step where an operator copies numbers off a sheet. Every figure in the module comes either from the shop or from counting.

When the rollout is done

The list of screens to check is on its own page: Rollout checklist.