How to create a physical inventory?
📌 What is a physical inventory?
📌 How to create and complete an inventory
What is a physical inventory?
A physical inventory or stock count records the quantity of products you physically have at a specific time.
You can create multiple inventories to organize counts by location — such as a storeroom, fridge or bar — or by any structure that suits your operation.
A clear structure helps you identify where each product was counted and improves the accuracy of consumption and CoGS calculations.
How to create and complete an inventory
- Go to Inventories and select New inventory.
- Add a name and description. You can also add an image to the inventory in the app.
- Select Edit list.
- Find and select the products or preparations you want to include. You can filter them by category and supplier.
- Return to the inventory and select New version. Choose one of these options:
- Reset quantities to 0: start the count from scratch.
- Keep quantities: use the current quantities as your starting point.
- Enter the quantities:
- Purchase units: complete containers, boxes or purchase formats.
- Loose units: the remaining quantity outside a complete purchase format.
- Review each product's total quantity and cost before saving.
If you see a Missing conversion warning, complete the purchase-format conversion. Without it, haddock cannot correctly convert purchase units into the product's base unit.
Versions and history
Every time you save a count, haddock creates an inventory version. The inventory date represents the business day the count belongs to; it is not necessarily the time when you saved it.
You can save the same inventory several times with the same date. In that case, haddock treats the most recently saved version within that date as the current one. Inventory history and CoGS therefore use the latest correction instead of an earlier version of the same count.
To review versions, open the inventory and select Inventory history. You can see the saved counts and their value there.
Units, quantities and cost
A product's total quantity combines loose units and purchase units according to its configured conversion.
For example, if one bottle contains 0.75 l and you count 16 bottles, the inventory records a total of 12 l.
If you later change the product's base unit within the same dimension — for example, from ml to l or from gr to kg — haddock displays earlier inventories in the current unit. Quantity and price are converted in opposite directions to preserve the same economic value, and the number of purchase formats you counted is not reinterpreted.
The cost shown in the inventory follows the product's configured reference price: last price, weighted average price or custom amount.
Practical examples
Example 1 | Complete formats and loose units
You buy a product in boxes of 12 units. During the count, you find 2 complete boxes and 5 loose units.
Enter 2 as purchase units and 5 as loose units. With a conversion of 12 units per box, the total is 29 units.
Example 2 | Correcting a count on the same date
You save an inventory dated July 31 and later notice that one bottle was missing. Create or save the corrected version with the same date.
The version saved most recently for July 31 is the one haddock uses as the current count for that day.
Example 3 | A product in multiple inventories
The same product may appear in both Storeroom and Bar. In CoGS, the product's opening and closing inventory figures add together the quantities counted in both inventories.
Expand the product row to see each inventory, its quantity and the date it was counted. Purchases, sales and waste belong to the restaurant as a whole and are not split between inventories.
How it relates to CoGS
CoGS uses physical inventories as reference points for calculating consumption:
Opening inventory + Purchases − Closing inventory = Consumed
At each period boundary, haddock starts from the latest available count and, when needed, carries it forward with the purchases, sales and waste recorded up to that date.
- Counted: the figure matches the count because there were no purchases, sales or waste to carry forward between that count and the period boundary. The count may be from an earlier day; it does not have to be taken on the boundary date itself.
- Estimated: at least one movement occurred after the count, so the figure was calculated from it.
If the product is held in several inventories and they were not all counted on the same date, the breakdown shows when each one was counted. The quantity from an older inventory count is carried forward unchanged to the reference date, so it is best to count all locations at a similar frequency.
For the other columns, formulas and recommendations, see Analyze the Cost of Goods Sold (CoGS).
Edit, export or delete
Remove a product
- Select Edit list.
- Find the product.
- Clear its checkbox and confirm the change.
This unlinks it from the inventory; it does not delete the product from haddock.
Change general settings
Select Edit inventory to change its name, description or image, or to delete the inventory.
Export the inventory
Open the inventory, select Export inventory, and choose PDF or Excel.
Frequently asked questions
Q: Which version is used if I save several with the same date?
A: The last version you saved within that date.
Q: Does changing from ml to l or from gr to kg change an old inventory's value?
A: No. Haddock converts the quantity and price to the current unit while preserving the same economic value.
Q: What does “Counted” mean in CoGS?
A: There were no purchases, sales or waste between the count used and the start or end of the period. It does not necessarily mean the count was taken on that same day.
Q: Why does “Estimated” appear even though I have a physical inventory?
A: Movements occurred after the latest count, so haddock had to carry its quantity forward to the period date.
Q: Can I count the same product in several inventories?
A: Yes. CoGS adds the quantities together and lets you expand the product to see how much was counted in each inventory.
Q: Why does the cost not match the latest invoice amount?
A: Check the product's reference-price setting. The inventory may use the last price, weighted average price or a custom amount.
Updated on: 06/08/2026
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