How Much Inventory to Order for a First Production Run

Before you commit, gather whatever signal you have. A small brand rarely has sales history, but it usually has something.

• Preorders or a waitlist for the first drop.
• Email subscribers and how many opened your last message.
• Sales from a previous pop-up, sample sale or small batch.
• Engagement on the posts that showed the product.

Then decide how much risk you can carry. Many first-time brands choose a smaller run with a plan to reorder, because selling out and restocking is a better problem than paying for storage on stock that does not move. A preorder can also tell you demand before you order.

Fewer styles, deeper sizes

A common first-run mistake is too many styles in too few units each. Every style comes in several sizes, so ten styles can mean fifty or more SKUs with only a handful of units in each. Fewer styles with a full size run usually sell better and are easier to manage.

A size curve is the share of each size you order. Most brands sell more of the middle sizes than the extremes, but every audience is different, and fits differ by style. A boxy tee and a slim tee will not sell the same sizes.

After the first drop, record what sold out first and what was left. That is the start of your real size curve. See size curve planning.

Know how long a reorder takes from your factory, including shipping. If a reorder takes many weeks, a fast sell-out means a long gap with nothing to sell. Decide in advance which styles you will reorder and at what stock level.

When the first run arrives, your warehouse makes it sellable. At OC3PL, labeled inbound is received and slotted within one business day, and every size and color has its own location. There are no order minimums, so a first collection is welcome, and storage is billed on the space you actually use. See how to prep apparel inventory for a 3PL and reorder points.

• Ordering the same quantity of every size instead of following demand.
• Launching too many colors of one style.
• Spending everything on the first run and having nothing left for a reorder.
• Ignoring the factory's lead time, so a sell-out turns into a long gap.
• Skipping bags and labels at the factory, which slows receiving at the warehouse.
• Not recording what sold out first, so the second order repeats the first one's mistakes.

None of these are fatal. Every brand learns its real demand by selling. The point is to make the first run small enough to learn from and large enough to meet the demand you can already see.

What to record after the first drop

Write down how fast each style and size sold, what was left over, and what customers returned and why. That one page is the most valuable planning document a new brand has. It turns the second production order from a guess into an estimate.