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offcntrTwenty-four years ago, when I did my first Schedule C for Off Center Ceramics, I had no idea how important the question was: Does this business maintain an inventory? I checked "yes."
So every year since, I've had to count the pottery.
It's actually a good habit. I've taken to doing inventories several times a year--after big shows, when preparing for a firing. With as many different items and patterns as I have, it's good to have better-than-guesswork on what I have and need to make.
We've gotten more organized over time. This year we even kept an inventory, in real time, of what pots we had at Holiday Market, updating as things were sold or replaced from storage. I keep a blank tally form on my computer that we can print off and use every time we need it, checking off standard patterns on bowls and mugs, filling in the less predictable pie plates, bakers, serving bowls and jars.
We just did the end-of-year 2017 tally on Tuesday; I shifted and opened boxes, Denise wrote things down. I haven't gone through and totaled up value of the whole works--that'll wait until I start my taxes in late February--but I do have a better idea of where I stand before my first firing of 2017.
I have more soup bowls than I expected--108--though within that there are a few patterns I'm almost out of. I also thought I'd sold more toddler bowls, but I still have 42 of them, in a good spread of patterns. Fifty-nine stew mugs, with no fox and only one bunny pattern left. Fifty-two painted mugs, but I'm out of one pattern, down to one each of five more. I made two bags of mugs--50 lbs., 48 mugs--for my next firing, and it won't be any too many.
Tableware I'm lowest on are dessert plates and tall mugs, 29 and 28 respectively. I've also got only 29 tumblers, but they're less popular, so I can put off making more of them a bit longer. Baking and serving pots show some surprising holes: only two $50 serving bowls and no $60 server, two small batter bowls, three small square bakers. Large pitchers and covered pitchers are also a little thin, though I'm okay on teapots tureens, and cookie jars.
I'm also going to have to make more banks before spring, but that'll wait for my next firing. Right now I'm focussing on plugging holes in the pottery inventory, and getting through the full page of special orders for the new year.
So every year since, I've had to count the pottery.
It's actually a good habit. I've taken to doing inventories several times a year--after big shows, when preparing for a firing. With as many different items and patterns as I have, it's good to have better-than-guesswork on what I have and need to make.
We've gotten more organized over time. This year we even kept an inventory, in real time, of what pots we had at Holiday Market, updating as things were sold or replaced from storage. I keep a blank tally form on my computer that we can print off and use every time we need it, checking off standard patterns on bowls and mugs, filling in the less predictable pie plates, bakers, serving bowls and jars.
We just did the end-of-year 2017 tally on Tuesday; I shifted and opened boxes, Denise wrote things down. I haven't gone through and totaled up value of the whole works--that'll wait until I start my taxes in late February--but I do have a better idea of where I stand before my first firing of 2017.
I have more soup bowls than I expected--108--though within that there are a few patterns I'm almost out of. I also thought I'd sold more toddler bowls, but I still have 42 of them, in a good spread of patterns. Fifty-nine stew mugs, with no fox and only one bunny pattern left. Fifty-two painted mugs, but I'm out of one pattern, down to one each of five more. I made two bags of mugs--50 lbs., 48 mugs--for my next firing, and it won't be any too many.
Tableware I'm lowest on are dessert plates and tall mugs, 29 and 28 respectively. I've also got only 29 tumblers, but they're less popular, so I can put off making more of them a bit longer. Baking and serving pots show some surprising holes: only two $50 serving bowls and no $60 server, two small batter bowls, three small square bakers. Large pitchers and covered pitchers are also a little thin, though I'm okay on teapots tureens, and cookie jars.
I'm also going to have to make more banks before spring, but that'll wait for my next firing. Right now I'm focussing on plugging holes in the pottery inventory, and getting through the full page of special orders for the new year.