Just-in-time inventory is borrowed from manufacturing. Applying it to e-commerce, where you do not control the production line or the carrier, is a different exercise entirely.
What the Test Looked Like
A Canadian apparel seller with 3 warehouse staff and roughly 400 monthly orders ran a 60-day trial. The goal was to reduce on-hand stock to no more than 14 days of supply for each of 38 core SKUs. Orders were placed more frequently, in smaller quantities, from 2 suppliers.
Every inbound shipment was monitored using purolator tracking and 17track for cross-border orders from the US supplier. The actual in-transit data mattered because the entire model depended on knowing when stock would arrive, not when it was supposed to.
Where It Worked
- Storage costs dropped noticeably. Fewer units on hand meant less warehouse space consumed.
- Cash flow improved in weeks 3 through 8 because less money sat in unsold product.
- Slow-moving variants were easier to identify and cut when orders were placed in smaller runs.
Where It Failed
- One supplier had a 4-day delay in week 5. That alone caused 9 stockouts.
- Shipping costs per unit rose by approximately 18% because smaller orders did not qualify for volume discounts.
- The team spent significantly more time placing and tracking orders, roughly 6 additional hours per week.
The model is not wrong. It is fragile. For sellers who tried this and hit a supplier delay that wiped out the gains, the fix is not abandoning the approach. It is building a 10-day emergency buffer for your 5 highest-velocity SKUs and treating that as untouchable stock.