Calculating raw material availability in cart

[JenWW_850]

Hi all!

I’m wondering if anyone has had a similar situation to mine. 

I sell food items that come in various quantities (50g and 250g). I purchase my stock in 1kg bags. When someone purchases either size variant, I need the other size variant quantity to reduce in line with the raw material availability. 

I have trialled multiple bundle and raw material inventory apps with some success - I have managed to link the variants to the raw materials available and have the quantities successfully reduce after each purchase. What none of the apps seem to be able to do, however, is adjust the raw materials available after the items are added to the cart but before purchase. For example, I have 1 kg of raw materials available and a customer adds 4 x 250g packs to their cart. If they go on to place the order, the inventory will adjust and the next customer will be prevented from ordering any 250g or 50g packs as the raw material stock is now zero. If, however, the customer adds the 4 x 250g packs to their cart and tries to add a 5th, the system will say there is only a maximum of 4 available and prevent them adding more. Yet they can go back to the product page and select the 50g variant and the system will allow them to order 5 x 50g. When they complete the purchase, I have now sold 4 x 250g and 5 x 50g on one order, so a total of 1.25kg when I only have 1kg available. 

Are there any apps out there that will adjust the quantity of raw materials available (therefore the item quantities available across connected variants) after an item is added to cart, rather than after a purchase is processed? I find it hard to believe that there aren’t many stores that have faced a similar scenario as it doesn’t seem to be a unique situation. 

Many thanks!

[Taknify]

Very hard to find any app for your specific use cases. If one thing might work from an app then the other thing might not be a feature that the app supports. You need to create a custom solution instead of relying on an app that might or might not work. 
Having said that you can try getting other apps to try out:
https://apps.shopify.com/prediko?search_id=a91554c4-e8d6-4aff-bd9e-a30e2cb5a9d8&surface_detail=raw+m...

 https://apps.shopify.com/materials-inventory?search_id=5ea47e49-52df-4458-baab-761cf3537554&surface_...

But also see if you can instead create a custom app that caters to your specific use case.
Let me know if you need help or have any other questions.

[Easify-Mark]

Hi @JenWW_850,

I understand your requirements, but there are some limitations with Shopify that make it difficult to fulfill them directly. Inventory adjustments can only be made after an order has been placed.

To help minimize this issue, you can consider using the Easify Inventory Sync app. In addition to its main function of linking your variants (50g, 250g) with the base inventory (e.g.: 1kg) and automatically adjusting inventory after an order is placed, it also has an Inventory Threshold feature. This allows you to set low inventory notifications, so you can stay informed and plan to restock before running low, helping you avoid the issues you mentioned 😉.