Cost Prices and Inventory Value

Under Inventory → Cost Prices, you’ll find a comprehensive overview of the cost prices for your entire product range. From here, you can quickly identify items that are missing a cost price, correct errors, and ensure that both your profit margin and your inventory value are as accurate as possible. This guide explains what the page does, how to use it, and why the numbers you see sometimes don’t match reality.

The most important thing to know first: The Cost Prices page never changes your inventory value on its own. The numbers on your dashboard only update when you click the button and confirm the changes yourself. So you can safely look around without anything suddenly changing.

Why does my inventory value often appear too low?

Many store owners find that the inventory value listed on the dashboard under “Reported Inventory Value” and in Inventory Statistics is much too low. The explanation is that there are actually two different factors at play, and they aren’t automatically linked:

• The cost price of the product or variant. This is the price you paid for the item, and it determines your profit margin and contribution margin in the sales statistics.
• The price of the inventory entries. Every time you receive goods into inventory (a goods receipt), a price can be recorded for that specific entry. This is the price used to calculate your total inventory value.

The problem arises because most people never enter a price for the goods receipt itself. You might enter a cost price for the product—or none at all. As a result, the system calculates the inventory value based on a price that is zero or missing, causing the value to be displayed too low. The Cost Prices page is designed to correct both issues so that your numbers finally add up.

The two figures explained in plain language

Think of it as two questions the system asks about every single item:

1. How much do I make on this item? This is answered by the product’s cost price. If you have a cost price, Shoporama can calculate how much you make every time the item is sold. That’s your profit margin and your contribution margin.
2. What is my inventory worth right now? This corresponds to the price at which the items were received. For each item you have in stock, multiply the quantity by the price at which it was received. Adding these together gives you the total inventory value.

Inventory value is calculated as a weighted average price based on quantity, not on a FIFO basis. The average includes all goods received for that product, even those that were sold long ago, so if purchase prices fluctuate, the value may differ from what the items currently on the shelf cost you. This is explained in more detail in “Calculating Inventory Value.” Entered cost prices are still a prerequisite for the figure to be useful at all.

The two figures are related, but they are not the same, and they are not automatically updated based on each other. Therefore, you can easily have good profit margin statistics and yet a stock value that looks completely wrong. The Cost Prices page keeps the two separate so you can consciously decide when and how each figure should be adjusted.

Here’s how: Fill in missing cost prices

The most common task is to enter cost prices for items that are missing them. This corrects your profit margin statistics and does not affect the inventory value.

1. Go to Inventory → Cost Prices.
2. Select the Missing Cost Price tab. Here you’ll find the products and variants that do not yet have a cost price.
3. Enter the cost price directly in the field next to each item. All cost prices are entered excluding sales tax.
4. Click Save Cost Prices. Your profit margin statistics are updated immediately. The inventory value remains unchanged.

If you previously received the item with a purchase price, the page will often suggest the most recent known price, so you can accept it with a single click instead of entering it manually.

Here’s how: Adjust your inventory value

If you want the inventory value to be accurate, you need to enter the price for items that are in stock but for which the inventory receipts are missing a price.

1. Select the "Missing In-Stock Price" tab. Here you’ll find products that are in stock but are under-counted in the inventory value because their stock receipts lack a price.
2. Enter the cost price (excluding VAT) for each item, or accept the suggested price shown on the page.
3. Click “Update Inventory Value.” You’ll see a confirmation showing exactly what will happen before any changes are made.
4. Confirm. The cost price will now be entered into your goods received entries, and the inventory value on the dashboard will be updated.

This action only affects your goods received—that is, the entries where goods have been added to inventory. It never affects your sales. In other words, your historical sales figures will not be altered.

The Four Tabs

The page is divided into four tabs so you can quickly go to exactly what you need:

• Missing Cost Price. Products and variants without a cost price. Fill them in and click “Save Cost Prices.” This immediately corrects the profit margin statistics and does not affect the inventory value.
• Missing price in inventory. Products that are in stock but for which the inventory entries are missing a price, so they are under-counted in the inventory value. Enter the cost price and click "Update Inventory Value."
• Warnings. Products where the cost price is equal to or higher than the sales price excluding VAT. This results in zero or negative profit and is usually an entry or import error that you should investigate further.
• All Items. Your entire product range in one place, so you can correct any cost price, whether it’s missing or not.

Key figures, filters, and sorting

At the top of the page, you’ll find four key metrics that give you an immediate overview:

• Coverage rate. The percentage of items in your inventory that have a cost price. The closer you are to full coverage, the more you can rely on your inventory value.
• Missing Cost Price. Number of items without a cost price.
• Missing inventory price. The number of items for which the inventory entries are missing a price.
• Current inventory value. The value of your inventory right now.

To make it easy to work with many items, you can filter by supplier, brand, and whether the item is online or offline, as well as search by name or SKU. The columns can be sorted, and you can choose how many items to display per page. Your selection of the number of items will be saved for your next visit to the page. If you click on a product name, the row will be highlighted. Next to it, there are separate icons that take you directly to edit the product or view its inventory entries.

Price Suggestions and Bulk Actions

You don’t need to enter every single price manually. The page helps you in several ways:

• Price suggestions. If an item has previously been received with a purchase price, the page suggests the most recent known price, which you can accept with a single click.
• Set the same fixed price. Select multiple items and assign them all the same cost price at once.
• Calculate based on the selling price. Let the cost price be calculated as the selling price multiplied by a factor of your choice. This is handy if you typically have a fixed markup for a product group.
• Apply suggestions. Accept the price suggestions for all selected items in a single action.

Import and export cost prices using CSV

If you need to update many cost prices at once, it may be faster to do so in Excel. The page can both export your cost prices to a file and import them back again.

1. Export a CSV file from the page. The file is semicolon-separated and has four columns: SKU;Name;Cost Price;Selling Price_excl_VAT.
2. Open the file in Excel or a similar program, and enter the cost prices. Remember that the cost price must be exclusive of sales tax.
3. Save the file and import it back. The system matches each row by SKU, and both product SKUs and variant SKUs work.

This way, all your cost prices are updated at once, without you having to go in and correct them one by one.

Important to know

• Cost prices are always specified excluding VAT.
• The cost price is used internally for inventory value, markup, and accounting. It is never displayed on your online store. The only way it can be made public is if you manually select it as a field in a product feed.
• The inventory value only changes when you click “Update Inventory Value” and confirm. There are no sudden jumps in the numbers.
• "Update Inventory Value" only applies to incoming shipments (items that have been received), never to sales. Your historical sales are never overwritten.
• Once the cost prices are set, all new sales going forward will automatically be assigned the correct cost price, so that profit margins and inventory value remain accurate.
• The inventory value is an average calculation, not a FIFO calculation. If you’ve purchased the same item at very different prices over time, the figure may differ from your actual inventory value, even when all cost prices have been entered.

Frequently Asked Questions

I’m not very tech-savvy. Will anything go wrong if I just click around on the page?

No. You can safely look around. Nothing changes until you actively click “Save Cost Prices” or “Update Inventory Value,” and you’ll even receive a confirmation of the inventory value first. Nothing changes on its own.

Will the cost price be displayed in my store so customers can see what I paid for the item?

No. The cost price is never displayed on your online store, and customers only see your selling prices.

There is one exception that you control yourself: if you create a product feed under Products> Product Feeds, you can select "Cost Price (excl. VAT) " as one of the fields. If you do this, remember to password-protect the feed; otherwise, anyone who knows the URL can see your purchase prices. Shoporama will warn you if you select this field in an unprotected feed. Read more in “Build Your Own Feeds.”

Should I enter the cost price with or without tax when preparing my financial statements?

Always exclude VAT. Both the inventory value and the profit margin are calculated based on amounts excluding VAT, so the figures match what your accountant expects to see.

If I update the inventory value now, will that change my old sales figures or my previous accounting records?

No. “Update Inventory Value” only applies to goods received—that is, the items that have been added to inventory. Your historical sales will never be changed, so previously closed periods remain as they are.

I have several thousand items. Can I update cost prices in bulk instead of one at a time?

Yes. You can select multiple items and set the same fixed price, calculate the cost price based on the sales price multiplied by a factor, or apply price suggestions in a single step. If you need to manage your entire product range, you can export to CSV, fill in the data in Excel, and import it back.

How does the CSV import match my products, and does it also work for variants?

The import matches by SKU, and both product SKUs and variant SKUs work. The file is semicolon-separated with the columns SKU, Name, Cost Price, and Sales Price (excluding tax). Make sure each line has the correct SKU so the price is assigned to the right product.

I receive products from multiple suppliers at different prices. How do I find their specific products?

Use the supplier filter at the top of the page, possibly in combination with the brand filter. That way, you’ll only see the items you’re looking for. If you’ve previously received an item at a specific price, the page will also suggest the most recent known purchase price, which you can accept with a single click.

I’m new and need to adjust cost prices. Where do I start if I don’t know what’s missing?

Start with the “Missing Cost Price” tab and work your way through it. Then look at the “Warnings” tab, which lists items with a cost price equal to or higher than the sales price—in other words, likely errors. The key figures at the top show you at all times how much is still missing.

What does the coverage ratio at the top of the page mean?

The coverage ratio shows what percentage of the items you have in stock have a cost price. The higher it is, the more accurate your inventory value is. Aim for full coverage so you can trust the number.

Need help?

If you’re unsure about how to set up your cost prices or your inventory value, you’re always welcome to email us at support@shoporama.dk. We’ll be happy to help you get started.