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Retail
Thornfield Stores
Stockouts -71%, £95k annual saving
-71%
Stockouts
14% of SKUs→4%
£95k
Annual saving
£12k/mo loss→£95k saved
9 wks
Go-live
n/a→9 weeks
The challenge
What wasn't working
Stockouts cost roughly £12k/month in lost sales across 14 stores. Manual ordering relied on a buyer's feel for demand, and supplier lead times were unpredictable. Excess stock on slow movers tied up another £40k of working capital.
The architecture
How we solved it
POS data, supplier lead-time history, and an external demand-signal feed (weather, events, calendar) feed a forecasting model that orders 3 weeks ahead of need per SKU per store. Buyers approve in batches; the system handles the routine 80%.
Stack used
Custom forecasting modelLightspeed POSWeather APIGoogle CalendarXero
The result
What happened
Stockouts fell 71%. Excess stock on slow movers fell 38%, releasing £52k of working capital. Combined annual saving in year 1: £95k against a build cost recouped inside 9 weeks.
“
The forecast accuracy is what surprised us most. We expected automation; we got a buyer that out-performs ours on the routine SKUs.
Priya AnandHead of Buying · Thornfield Stores
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