When to Reorder, and How Much Buffer to Hold
By The Velocity Wear Team
Most stockouts are arithmetic failures rather than forecasting ones. The stock ran out because the reorder was placed when the shelf looked empty rather than when the numbers said to place it, and in apparel the lead time is long enough that this difference matters a great deal.
The reorder point
You reorder when remaining stock equals what you expect to sell during the replenishment lead time, plus a buffer. Not when you are nearly out — by then you are already committed to a gap.
So if a full cycle takes eight weeks and you sell twenty a week, the reorder point is 160 plus buffer. Ordering at 60 guarantees five weeks with nothing to sell.
Getting the lead time right
- 1**Include your own approval time,** which is part of the cycle and routinely omitted.
- 2**Use production lead time in the relevant season,** not the quiet-period figure. Autumn is slower across the industry.
- 3**Include freight and clearance,** which varies by mode.
- 4**Include receiving and putaway.** Stock in a box is not stock you can sell.
Most people underestimate their lead time by weeks because they measure production only. Measure the whole cycle from decision to sellable.
Safety stock
Buffer against two things: demand being higher than expected, and lead time being longer than expected. Both happen, and they compound — a busy period is exactly when factories are also busy.
How much depends on how bad a stockout is for you. If it means a lost sale, hold less. If it means a customer goes elsewhere permanently, or a uniform programme cannot kit a new starter, hold more. Safety stock is insurance and it is priced accordingly — carrying it costs money and space.
Do it per size, not per style
This is where apparel differs from most inventory. Selling out of medium while XS sits is functionally a stockout, because the customers arriving want medium.
Calculate the reorder point on your fastest-moving sizes and reorder the curve you have observed rather than the one you originally ordered. A per-design minimum makes that practical — you can reorder a spread weighted to what actually sold.
The reorder that is not worth placing
Sometimes the right decision is to let it sell out. A design at the end of its life, a seasonal item late in the season, a piece with declining sell-through — reordering these is how deadstock is created deliberately.
A reorder point is a prompt to make a decision, not an instruction to buy.
