Inventory Shrinkage and Unauthorized Ingredient Usage

$10,000–$50,000+ per year in recurring shrink from untraced overages/shortages, stolen or diverted high‑value ingredients, and unbilled or mis‑billed usage that cannot be tied back to specific lots, orders, or customers. • Chronic shrink in high-volume, mid‑value commodities and occasional loss of premium additives can cost $10,000–$40,000/month across farms, plus performance losses from under‑ or over‑feeding. • Cumulative shrink across bulk bins, bagged product, and in‑store blends can reach $5,000–$25,000/month per location, compounded by margin erosion from unbilled giveaways and mis‑priced substitutions.

Staff rely on manual bin readings, paper tickets, and ad‑hoc spreadsheets to reconcile what should be on hand versus what production or customers supposedly consumed; discrepancies are handled by adjusting inventory balances by feel and blaming normal shrink instead of tracing specific lots or users. • The inventory controller exports ERP data into Excel, manually layers in count sheets and production logs, and posts bulk adjustment entries while keeping personal spreadsheets to track recurring unexplained losses by ingredient and location. • The inventory controller runs ad-hoc Excel reconciliations between system balances, manual bin measurements, and paper issue slips from feed rooms or barges, adjusting ERP quantities by hand to force alignment.