Stock and locations
Keep stock per variant at each warehouse or shop, choose what can sell when it runs out, see how checkout holds stock, and link locations to MAM branches.
How-to guide3 min read
Commerce Orbit counts stock for each variant at each of your locations: warehouses, shops or anywhere else you keep goods. Shoppers see what is available across all of them together.
Locations
Open Locations to see where you keep stock. Commerce Orbit starts with one, Warehouse, as your default location. Admins can add, change and remove locations. Each has:
- Name, such as Oslo warehouse, and a short code, such as
OSL, in capital letters, numbers and hyphens. Each code is used once. - Address, shown to shoppers who collect
- Collection in store: when on, shoppers can choose to pick up their order here for free. See Shipping and taxes.
- MAM branch, such as
BGN, when you use MAM. See below. - Default: the location returned stock goes back to. There is always exactly one.
The default location can't be removed; make another one the default first. A location that still has stock can't be removed either: move the stock first.
Stock on a product
On a product, each variant shows its stock at every location. Editors and Admins can type a new number to set it, for example after a stock count. Setting stock tells CMS Orbit, so website pages showing the product update.
Two switches on each variant decide what happens when stock runs out:
| Setting | What shoppers see |
|---|---|
| Track stock off | Always available. No count is kept or shown. |
| Track stock on, Sell when out of stock off | Sold out when nothing is left. A cart with more than is left says how many are left, and checkout stops until the shopper changes it. |
| Track stock on, Sell when out of stock on | Always available. Stock can go below zero, so you can see how many to order in. |
What a shopper can buy is the total of all locations. A location with stock below zero counts as zero.
How checkout uses stock
Stock is taken when the shopper starts to pay, not when they put something in the cart, so a full cart never blocks anyone else. It comes from the location with the most of that variant.
- If a card payment isn't finished within the time under Hold stock for in Shop settings, 15 minutes unless you change it, the order is cancelled and the stock comes back.
- If the shopper changes the cart before paying and checks out again, the first unpaid order is cancelled and its stock comes back.
- Orders on invoice take stock straight away, as they are placed at once.
Cancelling an order puts its stock back unless you choose not to. A refund can put the refunded items back too. Returned stock goes to the default location. See Refunds and cancellations.
Low stock
When an order takes a variant from more than 3 down to 3 or fewer, Admins and Editors get a Low stock notification. Overview lists active products with 3 or fewer left, and Products can filter by Low stock and Out of stock. See Notifications.
Stock from MAM
When MAM is on, it is the source of stock for every product with a MAM part number. Commerce Orbit asks MAM every 15 minutes, unless you chose another interval, and writes the answer over the stock you see:
- A location with a MAM branch gets MAM's stock for that branch.
- If no location has a branch, MAM's total stock goes to your default location.
- MAM can report stock below zero. Commerce Orbit keeps the number as MAM gives it and treats it as zero for shoppers.
Changing the stock of a MAM product by hand lasts only until the next sync. Products without a part number keep the stock you set. Shoppers always see the last synced stock, so a slow or unreachable MAM never holds up your shop. See The MAM integration.
Not there yet
Stock transfers between locations, purchase orders and a history of stock changes aren't part of Commerce Orbit yet.
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