Tracking stock across size runs, colours, and multiple warehouse locations in a spreadsheet that breaks every time a new season launches?
Purchase orders with suppliers managed in email, so production delays only become visible when items fail to arrive rather than when the delay first occurs?
Fashion Inventory Management Software Development
Spreadsheets break every time a new season launches. Size runs across colours, collections, and multiple warehouse locations are too complex for a tool that was not built for fashion. Purchase orders with suppliers managed in email mean production delays are only visible when items fail to arrive.
We build custom inventory and production management software for fashion brands. Size run tracking, purchase order management with supplier lead times, sample and development tracking, and sell-through analytics -- built around how your buying and production teams actually work.
Size run inventory tracking across colours, collections, and locations
Purchase order management with supplier lead time monitoring
Sample and development tracking from concept to production
Sell-through and markdown analytics by style, size, and channel
RaftLabs builds custom inventory management software for fashion brands covering size run tracking across colours, collections, and seasons, purchase order management with supplier lead time monitoring, sample and development tracking, warehouse management, and sell-through and markdown analytics. A custom system is the right choice when off-the-shelf platforms cannot model your size run hierarchy or handle the season and collection complexity your buying team works with. Most fashion inventory projects deliver in 10-14 weeks at a fixed cost.
100+Software products shipped
·FixedCost delivery
·10-14Week delivery cycles
·24+Industries served
Why fashion inventory is different from general inventory
Fashion inventory has a structure that general inventory platforms do not model well. Every style ships in a size run. Each size run runs across multiple colours. Each colour-size combination is a distinct stock position. A brand with 50 styles, 4 colours, and 8 sizes has 1,600 stock positions per season -- before multi-location complexity is added.
Generic inventory tools aggregate at the product level and the numbers drift. A fashion-specific system models the hierarchy -- style, colour, size, location, season -- and keeps every position accurate after every sale, receipt, transfer, and markdown. When the stock position is right, reorder decisions are right. Sell-through reports are right. Markdown decisions are made on data rather than on what the buying team remembers about last season.
Purchase order management follows the same logic. Fashion POs are tied to size runs, seasons, and supplier lead times. A system built for the buying process generates the PO with the correct size breakdown, tracks the delivery against the supplier's confirmed lead time, and flags delays before they become production problems -- not after the goods fail to arrive.
What we build
Size run inventory management
Inventory tracking at the colour-size-location level for every style in your range. Stock positions are updated in real time after every sale, goods receipt, transfer, and write-off. The system models your season and collection hierarchy so stock reports reflect your buying team's structure, not a flat SKU list. Open-to-buy calculations use current stock positions and confirmed inbound orders to show what remains to be bought for the season. Size run coverage reporting shows which sizes are running short across the range before the season opens. The inventory foundation that makes buying decisions based on actual stock rather than last week's spreadsheet.
Purchase order and supplier management
Supplier catalogues with cost prices, minimum order quantities, size run minimums, and confirmed lead times. PO creation at the size run level with automatic size breakdowns based on your configured ratio or a custom split. PO approval workflow with configurable spend thresholds. Delivery tracking against the supplier's confirmed ship date with lead time monitoring that alerts the buying team when a shipment is running late -- before the window closes. Goods receipt at the size and colour level with quantity and condition recorded at the point of receipt. The PO workflow that surfaces production delays when there is still time to act.
Sample and development tracking
Sample requests raised against a style brief and tracked through each development stage: first sample, fit sample, salesman sample, and production approval. Comments, photos, and revision requests recorded against each stage. Delivery tracking for samples sent to buyers or press with return management. Development cost tracking per style including sampling, development rounds, and lab testing. Season calendar integration so the development timeline for each style is visible against the range-plan deadline. The development record that replaces the email chain and tells you exactly where each style is in the process.
Warehouse and fulfilment management
Multi-location inventory with per-location stock positions updated in real time. Inbound booking against open POs with discrepancy recording when quantities received differ from quantities ordered. Pick, pack, and despatch workflow for wholesale orders, retail replenishment, and e-commerce fulfilment. Stock transfer requests between locations with a request, approval, and confirmation workflow. Returns processing with reason codes and restocking or write-off decisions recorded at the item level. Location-level stock reports for each warehouse, 3PL, and store so fulfilment decisions are based on where stock actually is.
Sell-through and markdown analytics
Sell-through rate by style, colour, size, channel, and location updated as sales are recorded. Season-to-date performance against the open-to-buy plan. Size curve analysis showing which sizes are selling fastest and which are accumulating. Markdown candidate reporting: styles below the configured sell-through threshold at a defined point in the season, ranked by the inventory value at risk. Markdown impact modelling showing the margin effect of a given price reduction against the sell-through improvement required. The analytics layer that moves markdown decisions from gut feel to a calculation.
Season and collection planning
Range plan management by season and collection with style count, buy budget, and open-to-buy targets. Actual buys tracked against the plan as POs are raised so the buying team can see the committed spend at any point in the buying cycle. Carryover style management for styles that roll from one season to the next with adjusted buy quantities. Hindsight reporting at season close: planned vs actual sell-through by style and category. The planning layer that connects the range plan to the actual buying and selling record so next season's plan is built on this season's data.
Frequently asked questions
Generic inventory systems track quantity at the product level. Fashion inventory requires tracking at the colour-size-location level, which is a fundamentally different data model. A brand with 50 styles, 4 colours per style, and 8 sizes has 1,600 distinct stock positions per season. Generic platforms either flatten this into a single quantity per product -- which loses the size run detail -- or bolt on variants in a way that becomes unusable at scale. Fashion-specific systems model the hierarchy correctly from the start: style, colour, size, location, and season. Every downstream report -- sell-through, open-to-buy, markdown candidates -- is only as accurate as the underlying stock model. If the model is wrong, the reports are wrong.
Yes. Open-to-buy planning is built around the size run data model. The system calculates net remaining open-to-buy by style and size using current stock positions, confirmed inbound orders, and the season sales plan. When stock in a specific size falls to the reorder point, the system can generate a reorder recommendation at the size run level with the preferred supplier, minimum order quantity, and delivery date needed to arrive before the size sells out. Open-to-buy views show the buying team what has been committed against the season budget and what remains available to spend, broken down by category and collection. Reorder decisions are made on current data rather than on a manually maintained spreadsheet.
Yes. Multi-warehouse and 3PL integration is a standard part of fashion inventory projects. We integrate with 3PL warehouse management systems via API where the 3PL supports it, and via scheduled data exchange where they do not. Stock positions in each location -- including 3PL locations -- are reflected in the system in real time or near real time depending on what the 3PL's system supports. Inbound bookings are communicated to the 3PL through the same integration so the receiving team knows what is expected and when. Returns processed at the 3PL are reflected in the system without manual reconciliation. We document the integration design during discovery and confirm what each 3PL's system can support before development starts.
A full fashion inventory system -- size run tracking, purchase order management, supplier management, sample tracking, warehouse management, sell-through analytics, and season planning -- typically costs between $25,000 and $70,000 depending on the number of integrations, the complexity of your size run and season hierarchy, and the reporting depth required. A more focused build covering size run tracking and purchase order management without the full warehouse and analytics layer typically runs $12,000 to $35,000. Both ranges are fixed-cost and scoped before development starts. We scope the project in a discovery phase, agree the full feature list, and give you a fixed price before any development begins.
Tell us your season complexity, size run structure, current system, and where your buying team loses the most time. We will scope the right system and give you a fixed cost.
