Consignment Software for Seasonal Sales

Consignment and Resale Software

The very best option for seasonal sales is Best Consignment Shop Software. It's a one price (by the person who purchases the software). Purchase includes a 30-minute demo to assure that the program does all that is required and works properly for the intended purposes. There is no 'annual support plan' but support is available if needed at rates about half that of local IT services.

Consignment

The cheapest way to stock the shelves and racks at a seasonal sale is taking inventory on consignment. In Best Consignment Shop Software items can be marked down as the sale progresses to encourage purchase. At the end of the sale, unsold merchandise can be returned to consignors, donated to charity, transferred to shop ownership or destroyed.

The program allows variable consignor percentages so friends and family might get more of the sales proceeds than other sale participants.

At the sale one computer would host the program and inventory and POS (checkout) stations would connect to the host to share the same data in real time. Sales records will be invaluable so it would be prudent to backup the data frequently during the sale to preserve records.

Resale

Resale items may be things that you already own. (It's likely that the IRS will be interested in any item that is sold for a profit.)

In Best Consignment Shop Software 'resale' more commonly refers to purchasing items from individuals (as opposed to 'retail' below) and reselling them. In some areas of the country law enforcement now requires keeping seller information (for the purpose of tracking down stolen merchandise).

In the program, create a new record for a new seller and record as much information as is required or preferred then add the items purchased, recording the prices paid and anticipated selling prices. Payment of course takes place at the time inventory changes hands so a purchase agreement can be printed at that time.

The software keeps track of buy and sell prices, computes profit and loss for each item and for all items during a specified time period or by category.

Retail

Conducting a seasonal sale (or even a garage sale for that matter) provides an opportunity to raise some unexpected income from sales that are often not quite so apparent:

  1. Of course bring unwanted items that you own to the sale. This may be an opportune time to dump older computers and laptops, media and electronic devices...
  2. Encourage friends and family to sell their things but perhaps also donate them. Whatever doesn't sell can go into storage for the next sale or be donated to a thrift store.
  3. Buy new merchandise from suppliers (wholesalers, manufacturers, warehouses) and resell as retail inventory. A good example of this is 50 sets of screwdrivers costing $1 each which can be resold for $3.
  4. Buy inventory at garage sales, flea markets and other discount outlets for resale. Some things may not sell during the current sale but they may at subsequent sales.
  5. Look for bargains at Goodwill or any neighboring 'resale barns' where many items may be available for as little as 25c. Don't bother tagging them at the sale but put them in a $1-dollar bin.

In Best Consignment Shop Software and in most taxing jurisdictions purchasing from entities (as opposed to individuals) is 'retail' which doesn't require recording sources of merchandise (for tax purposes).

Like resale, BCSS will keep track of inventory, sales and computer profit/loss.