How minimum order quantities work in Restocio, and which one wins

Restocio uses one minimum per product, from the supplier you order it from: the product's own MOQ on that supplier's Products tab if you typed one, otherwise the supplier's MOQ per product. Then it rounds up to whole packs if a pack size is set. The freight MOQ in Settings and a supplier's order minimums only warn you. They never change a quantity.

Marcus VolstedCo-founder, Restocio Published 27 October 20269 min read

This guide is about the fields. Whether a supplier's minimum is worth meeting, and what to do when it is more than you need, is a buying decision, and the blog post on minimum order quantities works through it. Here the question is narrower: you have typed a number somewhere in Restocio, so what does it do to the quantity on the Replenishment card?

Which minimum fields does Restocio have?

There are five places a minimum can live, and only the first three change a quantity. Each one is defined below once, with what it does when it is blank.

Field on screen	Where you type it	What it controls	Blank or 0
MOQ (a row in the supplier's list)	Suppliers, open a supplier, Products tab, MOQ column	The least this supplier sells of that one product. The recommended quantity is raised to it	The product takes the supplier's MOQ per product, shown greyed in the box
Pack (a row in the supplier's list)	Suppliers, open a supplier, Products tab, Pack column	Units per carton or pack from this supplier. The quantity is rounded up to whole packs, after the minimum	No pack rounding. A pack of 1 changes nothing either
MOQ per product	Suppliers, Bulk edit view, one row per supplier. Also the box marked “All” under the MOQ heading of a supplier's Products tab	One minimum for every product from that supplier that has no MOQ of its own	No supplier-wide minimum
Minimum order and Minimum units	Suppliers, Bulk edit view	What the supplier wants for the whole order, as a value in a currency or as a unit count. Warns in the order dialog	No order minimum
Freight MOQ and Pack size	Settings, Inventory, “Freight MOQ per transport method”	The quantity below which a transport method stops paying off. Adds a note and a button to a card that falls under it	No floor and no multiple for that method

SKU Manager does not hold a minimum any more. Its Costs & weight tab has a read-only “MOQ · Pack” column that shows what the supplier terms say for each product, with a link to the right supplier on the Suppliers page. A minimum was moved there from the product because it belongs to the relationship: the same product can have a different minimum with a different supplier. If you find older advice that says to set a MOQ in SKU Manager, it is out of date. Any value that was stored on the product itself is ignored when an order is sized.

Which one wins when a product has more than one?

The product's own MOQ on its supplier's list wins over the supplier's MOQ per product, and each number is picked on its own. That means a product can take its minimum from the supplier and its pack size from its own row. The pack size has no supplier-wide version, so it is only ever the product's own.

Whichever supplier the product is ordered from is the one whose terms are read, so if you have moved a product to another supplier, that supplier's terms apply. The tables below use a plan of 10 units unless the row says otherwise. Each row is one of the cases the app's tests check, on both the page and the server.

Product's own MOQ	Supplier's MOQ per product	Pack	Plan before minimums	Order after
20	blank	blank	10	20
blank	50	blank	30	50
20	50	blank	10	20
20	blank	12	10	24
blank	20	6	10	24
20	50	12	0	0

Row three is the one that surprises people. The product's own 20 beats the supplier's 50, even though it is lower. The product's number is not a floor on top of the supplier's, it replaces it. The last row shows that a product with nothing to buy stays at 0. A minimum never pulls a product into an order it does not need.

If one product should be exempt from a supplier-wide minimum, type 1 in its MOQ box (a pack size on the row still rounds). A box left empty means “use the supplier's number”, so empty is not the same as no minimum.

How do the minimum and the pack size work together?

The minimum is applied first and the pack size second, so the quantity first reaches the floor and is then rounded up to a whole number of packs. A plan of 10 with a MOQ of 20 and packs of 12 becomes 20, then 24. The order carries 24 because 20 is not a whole number of 12s.

Those extra units are a purchase the supplier forces, not a need the plan found, so they go on the first route your plan can use, in the order boat, truck, train, plane. A route you switched on but that the plan never uses, because another route is both faster and cheaper, is skipped here too (Settings says when a route is set aside like that), and so is a route the supplier's Freight tab has switched off under Ships by. Take that same product with 6 planned by boat and 4 by train. The boat gets the 14 extra units, 20 by boat and 4 by train, 24 in all. If the boat is off, the extra goes to the next route the plan uses. The freight mode toggles guide covers what switching a route off does to the rest of the plan.

What does the card say when a minimum raises an order?

The Replenishment card says so, in one quiet line under the quantity, with the number before and after. You will read one of three sentences, depending on what moved the quantity.

What raised it	What the card says
The minimum only	Rounded up to the supplier's minimum: 10 → 20
The pack size only	Rounded up to whole packs of 4: 11 → 12
Both	Rounded up to the supplier's minimum of 20, in whole packs of 12: 10 → 24

That same sentence repeats in the order dialog while the quantity in it is still the plan's. In the Order by urgency panel, the dialog that creates drafts shows “MOQ applied to N SKUs” for the supplier, and hovering a line shows the before and after. Nothing is hidden: if a line is bigger than the sales rate alone would suggest, one of these lines names the reason.

If you type a quantity of your own below the supplier's minimum, or off whole packs, an amber line appears under it, for example “5 is under the supplier's minimum of 20.” It has a “Raise to 20” button. Restocio does not change your number. You can leave it and place the order anyway, which is sometimes right when the supplier has agreed a one-off.

What about the supplier's order minimum and the freight MOQ?

Both only warn. They are different questions from the product minimum, and they sit on different screens. A supplier's Minimum order or Minimum units describes the whole order, so it is checked when you save or draft one. The dialog says something like “This order has 400, so 100 more are needed,” followed by “You can still save it.” Adding more from the same supplier is the usual way to clear it. A value minimum in a currency Restocio has no exchange rate for is not compared at all, and the dialog says so.

The freight MOQ is a per-route threshold on your own account. A card whose plan on that route falls under it gets a note with the missing quantity and a “Raise to” button. Leave the boxes empty and nothing changes anywhere. A route that carries 0 units for a product is never asked to reach its minimum, since not using a route is always allowed. The separate container fill-up question is the same idea at a larger scale, and it is a decision for you rather than a field.

How do I set a minimum for a whole supplier without losing the exceptions?

Type the number in the “All” box under the MOQ heading on that supplier's Products tab, or in the MOQ per product column on the Bulk edit view. If some products from that supplier already have a MOQ of their own, the All box asks first: “Overwrite products with their own MOQ?”, with “Keep their own” and “Use 500 for all” as the answers. Keeping their own leaves your exceptions alone. Using the new number for all clears each product's own MOQ, so it follows the supplier. The toast afterwards says how many products the number now applies to. Removing the supplier number gives “Bulk MOQ removed.” and leaves the product-level ones in place.

The limit to know about

Restocio raises a single product to its own minimum, but it does not top up a whole order to a supplier's order minimum. If your supplier wants 500 units or a set value across everything you buy, that is the Minimum units or Minimum order field, and it is advice only. Restocio will tell you the order is short and by how much, and you choose what to add. It will not pick the products and enlarge the order for you. That is on purpose, because what goes into a minimum order is your call. A product with no MOQ on its row and none on its supplier keeps its plan exactly as calculated.

Common questions

Which minimum order quantity does Restocio use when a product has more than one?

It uses the MOQ typed on that product's row in its supplier's Products tab, and only if that box is empty does it use the supplier's MOQ per product. The two are never added. Pack size is read separately and only from the product's own row, so a product can take its minimum from the supplier and its pack from itself. The product's own number wins even when it is lower than the supplier's. The supplier read is the one the product is ordered from.

Why did Restocio recommend more than my sales rate needs?

A minimum order quantity or a pack size raised it. When that happens the card says so in one line under the quantity, for example "Rounded up to the supplier's minimum: 10 → 20", so you can see the number before and after. The minimum is applied first and the pack size second, so a plan of 10 with a MOQ of 20 and packs of 12 comes out as 24. A product with nothing to buy is never raised.

Can I still set a MOQ in SKU Manager?

No. SKU Manager's Costs & weight tab shows each product's MOQ and pack size read-only, with a link to the supplier on the Suppliers page, where they are typed. A minimum is a term of the supplier relationship, so it is set per supplier. A MOQ stored on the product itself in an older version is ignored when Restocio sizes an order.

Does a supplier's Minimum order or Minimum units raise my quantities?

No. They describe what the supplier wants for the whole order, and Restocio only warns you when an order is under them, for example by saying how many units short it is. You can still save the order. Only the product MOQ and the pack size change a recommended quantity, and the freight MOQ in Settings adds a note and a button without changing one.

What does an empty MOQ box mean on a supplier's product row?

Empty means the product has no minimum of its own, so the supplier's MOQ per product applies and shows greyed out in the box. It does not mean no minimum. To exempt a product from a supplier-wide minimum, type 1 in its box. An empty Pack box means no pack rounding, because pack size has no supplier-wide default.

Marcus Volsted

Co-founder, Restocio

Marcus co-founded Restocio and works on it daily with a Swedish importer who plans their purchasing in it every working day. Restocio is built in Sweden by two founders, one Swedish and one Danish, and Marcus is the Danish one. Why we are building it.