MoneyStock
When the printed price on the pack changes
The new delivery reads a different price than the packs already on your shelf. Sell the older print first, and never charge above what the customer holds.
The day a delivery arrives with a different print
- 1Split the delivery before it touches the shelfOld print on one side, new print on the other, while the cartons are still on the floor.
- 2Never charge above the number on the pack in his handBelow the print is your choice. Above it is never allowed.
- 3Sell the older print first, whichever way it movedThat batch leaves the shelf first, up or down, every single time.
- 4Price the refill on what the refill cost youThe old batch's cost tells you nothing about the next order.
- 5Ask the company on the day, not a month laterA swap or an adjustment is possible on day one and almost never on day thirty.
The pack on your shelf reads Rs 200 and the one that just arrived reads Rs 225. Same item, two numbers. Keep the batches apart, sell the older print first, and never charge above what is printed on the pack the customer is holding. Then price the refill on what the refill cost you.
Two prices on one shelf by lunchtime
The delivery lands while you are busy. You slit the cartons open, push the packs onto the shelf and serve the man waiting with his bag. Nothing about that morning tells you anything has changed.
Kamran runs a general store beside a school. On a Wednesday at ten past nine the van drops six cartons of a washing powder he sells every day. He puts them out fast, because the school rush is coming. By one in the afternoon both prints are sitting side by side on one shelf. Some packs read Rs 200. Some read Rs 225. Neither he nor his helper can tell which is which at the speed a counter actually moves.
So every customer who picks up an older pack reads the lower figure and expects to pay it. Every customer who picks up a newer one asks why it went up. Kamran answers both from memory, a little differently each time, which is how a shop loses an argument it was never going to win. The printed number is not a suggestion. The customer is holding the evidence in his hand, and he can read.
The rule that ends every argument at the counter
One line covers all of it. You never charge more than the number printed on the pack the customer is holding.
Below the print, always allowed. Above it, never. A discount is yours to give; a rupee above the printed figure is not, and the moment you take it the customer stops trusting your shelf. He will not fight you over that rupee. He will start reading every pack in your shop, and then in the shop opposite.
That rule is also the easiest thing you will ever explain. No opinion, no bargaining, no memory involved. You point at the number, he reads the number, and it is over in four seconds. It protects you in the other direction too: a pack printed Rs 225 is a pack you may charge Rs 225 for, whatever somebody paid a while ago for a different pack.
When the printed price goes up
This is the common direction, and the easier one, though it does not feel easy at the counter.
Your old packs cost you less and read lower. Sell them at their own printed number, finish the batch, and the margin on it is exactly what you always expected. You lose nothing at all. The customer who picks one up pays less than the person who comes after him, and walks out happy without ever knowing why.
The mistake is charging the new figure on the old packs because the company has raised it. That earns you a few rupees and costs you the one thing that brings a customer back through your door.
The real work is on the refill. When the print goes up your cost usually goes up too, but not by the same amount, and that gap is where your margin quietly widens or narrows.
Sixty packs, and a print that went up Rs 25
Only an example, never a claim about any real product. Read both numbers: if your cost had risen Rs 28 while the print rose Rs 25, the same delivery would earn you Rs 3 a pack less.
Say you are holding sixty packs bought at Rs 168 with Rs 200 printed on them. The new delivery is printed Rs 225 and the company charges you Rs 189. The print rose Rs 25 and your cost rose Rs 21, so each new pack earns you Rs 4 more than an old one did. Across sixty packs that is Rs 240 you would never have noticed.
It runs the other way just as easily. Had the company charged you Rs 196 while raising the print by Rs 25, every pack would earn Rs 4 less and the shelf would look identical. The only way to know is to read your delivery bill on the day it arrives, next to the print, and write both figures down. That is the same habit that catches a supplier raising his rate quietly.
When the printed price goes down
This one is rarer and it hurts far more.
Your old stock cost you the higher rate and reads the higher number. It can now only be sold at the lower one, because the new packs sit right beside it and any customer can compare. Whatever margin you thought you had on that batch just got smaller, and the difference is a loss you have already paid for.
Say you took forty packs of a hair oil at Rs 195 each, printed Rs 250. You expected Rs 55 a pack, Rs 2,200 on the batch. The print drops to Rs 225. Now each pack earns Rs 30 and the batch earns Rs 1,200. One thousand rupees of what you counted on is gone, and no amount of waiting brings it back. So the question stops being how to save it, and becomes how fast you turn what is left into cash.
The print fell: clear the batch or let it sit
Sitting on the batch restores nothing. It only adds risk: a second drop, a date on the pack creeping closer, and your money locked in a shelf that could have been carrying something that sells. Clear the batch and you have Rs 9,000 back in the drawer to buy with. Leave it and most of it is still standing there three months later, earning the same Rs 30 a pack, minus whatever the delay cost you. This is exactly how stock that stops moving eats your cash.
Take the small loss on the day you find it. Move those packs to the front and let the batch finish.
Four things to do the day the delivery lands
Split the delivery before it touches the shelf. Old print on one side, new print on the other, while the cartons are still on the floor. Two minutes on the day saves you an argument every day after.
Sell the older print first, whichever way the number moved. When the print went up, those packs go out at their own lower figure and the customer gets a small gift he never asked for. When it went down, they go out at the new lower figure, and they go out quickly.
Price the refill on what the refill cost you. Write the new cost down the moment the bill is in your hand. The old batch's cost tells you nothing about your next order, and for every item where you set the selling rate yourself, that rate has to move with what refilling now costs.
If both prints must share a shelf, put the older ones in front. Not hidden at the back, not mixed through the middle. In front, where a busy hand reaches first.
Two prints on one shelf, handled well and badly
Do this
- Charge exactly what the pack in his hand says, or less.
- Split the two batches while the cartons are still on the floor.
- Put the older print at the front so it leaves first.
- Write the new cost down the day the delivery bill arrives.
- Tell whoever else stands at your counter which row is which.
Never this
- Stick your own price label over a printed number.
- Charge the new figure on a pack that reads the old one.
- Tip both prints into one row and sort it out at the counter.
- Hold a fallen-price batch back hoping the rate comes back up.
- Open every carton before you have asked about a swap.
What to say when he says "last time it was Rs 240"
Waqar comes in on a Saturday at quarter past seven with a pack in one hand and a figure in his head. "Last time you gave me this for Rs 240."
Do not argue about last time. Put the pack down on the counter, turn it so the print faces him, and say it plainly.
"You are right, and this one says Rs 265. Look at it. The company printed that, not me. I cannot charge you above what is written. If I still had one of the older packs, I would give it to you at Rs 240 right now."
Three things happen inside that sentence. You agreed with him, so there is nothing left to fight about. You pointed at a number neither of you wrote, so it stopped being your word against his. And you told him what you would have done if you could, which is the part he repeats to other people.
If an older pack really is still on the shelf, hand him that one at its printed figure and say so out loud. The Rs 25 you gave up buys a customer who stops checking whether you are honest. Never put your own sticker over a printed number: the moment one customer peels it, you are no longer a shop with a price, you are a shop with a story.
Ask the company on the day, not a month later
Most distributors have some way of handling a batch caught by a price change. A swap on the next delivery, a credit note, a small adjustment on the bill. Almost none of it is written on a poster, and almost all of it depends on when you ask.
Ask on the day the delivery arrives and you are a shopkeeper with a fair question. Ask thirty days later and you are one with a problem nobody can check. On day one the order is still on his screen, the driver remembers the drop, and nothing has moved.
Two things make a yes far more likely. Ask before you break the cartons open, because sealed goods can go back and loose packs on a shelf cannot. And ask with your figures ready: how many packs, the old print, the new print, the date on the bill.
If the answer is no, you have lost four minutes. If it is yes on a price drop, you have just recovered most of the Rs 1,000 that the printed number took off you.
Two batches at two rates in one record
In a paper register this is where the trouble starts, because a single line cannot hold two costs and two selling figures for the same item.
In Wasoolo the item carries a buy rate and a selling rate that you change in one place, so your shelf and your record never drift apart. Two deliveries at two rates stay two records, not one figure overwritten by the newer one, and the older batch keeps the cost it actually came in at. When that batch finishes, the profit view shows what it really earned instead of what you assumed before the print moved.
That matters most in the direction nobody plans for. A batch that was going to earn Rs 2,200 and earned Rs 1,200 should say so, once, somewhere you can see it, so the next order is placed by a shopkeeper who knows. Wasoolo is 100% free to download, and keeping a slow batch moving is the same habit that catches an expiry date before it costs you money.
Start your digital khata today
Free to start. Works offline. English, Roman Urdu & Hinglish. Your customers get their app free, forever.
Common questions
Can I charge the new printed price on packs that still show the old one?
No. The customer is holding that number and he can read it. Charge what is printed on the pack in his hand, sell the older print first, and let the batch finish on its own. A few rupees are never worth the doubt it plants.
The printed price dropped and my old stock cost me more. Who covers that?
Ask your distributor on the day, before you open the cartons, because a swap or a credit note is possible then and rarely after. If the answer is no, take the loss, price the batch at the new figure and clear it fast. Money in your hand beats a shelf holding a margin that no longer exists.
Should I put my own price sticker over the printed one?
Never on a printed pack. One customer peels it off, and every price in your shop becomes something to check. Keep your own written rates for loose goods and items that carry no print.
How do I stop the two batches mixing on the shelf?
Split them while the cartons are still on the floor. If they have to share a shelf, put the older print at the front so it leaves first, and tell whoever else stands at your counter which row is which.
My cost went up but the printed price did not move. What then?
Your margin on that item just got thinner and there is nothing on the shelf to show it. Read the delivery bill against the print, write the new cost down, then decide how many to order. Sometimes the honest answer is to order fewer and give the space to something that pays better.
Does Wasoolo handle two deliveries of one item at two different rates?
Yes. Each delivery is its own record with its own buy rate, and the item's selling rate is changed in one place. The profit view then shows what the older batch actually earned.
Stuck with a batch whose printed number moved under you? Tell us what happened and we will show you the shortest way to clear it and record it straight.