Move stock from the commissary to a truck

If you prep at a commissary and load the truck each morning, treat the commissary as its own location. Deliveries go into the commissary, a stock transfer moves what you load onto the truck, and sales take it off the truck. That way you can see at a glance what is left in the walk-in and what is on board.

Before you start

• The commissary exists as a location. See Add your truck and register. Multiple locations need the Fleet plan; see pricing.
• Stock tracking is switched on for the items you want to count, under Products > Edit > Manage stock. Most trucks track buns, tortillas, drinks, proteins and packaging, not every pinch of salt.
• Your units are sensible: count buns by the piece, proteins by the portion or kilo, drinks by the can.
• A data connection at the commissary and on the truck.

Steps

1. Record what is already in the commissary. Open Stock adjustment or Opening stock, choose the commissary location, and enter today’s counts. Do this once at the start.
2. When a supplier delivers, open Purchases > Add purchase. Choose the supplier, set the location to the commissary, add the items and quantities, and save. Stock goes up at the commissary. Add lot numbers and expiry dates here if you track them.
3. Each morning before you roll, open Stock transfers > Add stock transfer.
4. Set Location (from) to the commissary and Location (to) to the truck.
5. Add each item you are loading with the quantity. Tap the search box and type the first letters; the list fills quickly.
6. Set the status to Completed if the stock is on the truck now, or In transit if someone else is driving it over.
7. Save. The commissary count drops and the truck count rises by the same amount.
8. At the end of the day, transfer anything that comes back from the truck to the commissary the same way, with the locations reversed.
9. Set Alert quantity on key items so a low-stock warning shows on the dashboard before you run out. Use it to plan the next purchase.

Check it worked

• Reports > Stock report, filtered by the commissary, shows the lower count. Filtered by the truck, it shows the loaded count.
• During service, the truck count drops as you sell. When an item hits zero it drops off the POS and the online store.
• Stock transfers lists today’s transfer with the right from and to.

Common problems

The truck shows negative stock

You sold more than was transferred, usually because the morning transfer was skipped or short. Do the transfer now with what was actually loaded. If you often top up from a cooler without recording it, add a small transfer each time or count back at close.

Items show sold out on the truck but we have them

The transfer went to the wrong truck, or was left as in transit. Open the transfer, check the location, and mark it completed.

Counts drift over weeks

Waste and staff meals are not recorded. Use Stock adjustment with a reason, such as “spoiled” or “staff meal”, whenever stock leaves without a sale. A weekly physical count, entered as an adjustment, brings everything back in line.

Our commissary also runs catering

Use the same stock and log catering orders as sales or quotations at the commissary location. If you need a website for the kitchen itself, our sister site KitchenWebStudio builds managed websites for commissary and catering kitchens.

I do not want to track every ingredient

Do not. Track the items that run out and cost you sales. A short, accurate list beats a long, ignored one.

Related

• Stock and prep
• Read your end-of-day report
• Set up modifiers and sold out