Open-to-Buy Calculator

Open-to-buy is the budget guardrail that keeps you from overbuying one category and starving another. Move the dials below and watch each category's buying budget update in real time. The numbers are sample data, so nothing here is tied to a real store.

Target end inv. (% of period sales)70%

Target weeks of cover6 wks

Lead time2 wks

Category	Planned sales (8w)	+ Target end inv.	− Current inv.	= Open to buy (retail)	≈ Open to buy (cost)	Suggested order	Read
Dress	$6,000	$4,200	$5,000	$5,200	$2,184	$420	Room to buy
Shorts	$3,000	$2,100	$1,500	$3,600	$1,440	$840	Room to buy
Jeans	$5,000	$3,500	$9,000	-$500	-$225	$0	Don't buy
Shirts	$4,000	$2,800	$1,200	$5,600	$2,240	$2,400	Reorders over budget
All categories	$18,000	$12,600	$16,700	$13,900	$5,639	$3,660

What the dials mean

Three assumptions drive the whole calculation. The first sets your budget, the other two decide when a category is running low enough to reorder.

Target end inv. (% of period sales): Your stock-to-sales assumption. How much inventory you want left at the end of the period, as a percentage of that period's sales. A higher number means a bigger open-to-buy budget.
Target weeks of cover: How many weeks of stock you want to keep on hand. It decides when a category is running low enough to suggest a reorder.
Lead time: How long a reorder takes to arrive. It's added on top of weeks of cover, so a reorder is triggered early enough that you don't sell out while you wait.

What the columns mean

Each row works left to right toward the open-to-buy figure, then translates it into the wholesale cost you'd actually spend.

Category: The product category these planned-sales and inventory figures roll up to.
Planned sales (8w): Expected retail sales for the category over the eight-week period. The real tool pulls these from your last-year actuals once your store is connected; here they're round sample numbers.
+ Target end inv.: Retail value of the inventory you want left at the end of the period, set by the “% of period sales” dial.
− Current inv.: Retail value of what you already have in stock for that category.
= Open to buy (retail): The retail dollars you can still spend, calculated as planned sales plus target end inventory minus current inventory.
≈ Open to buy (cost): The same budget expressed at wholesale cost, using the category's average margin. This is what you'd actually write on purchase orders.
Suggested order: The wholesale cost of topping a category back up to your target weeks of cover plus lead time. Compare it against open to buy (cost) to see whether your orders fit the budget.
Read: A plain-English call. Room to buy, reorders over budget, or already overbought.

How this works. This is the reactive open-to-buy method: planned sales, plus target end inventory, minus current inventory, equals what you can still spend this period. It doesn't subtract orders you've already placed but haven't received yet, so if you've committed to big buys months ahead, knock that amount off the figure. The sample numbers here exist to show how the math moves; a plan built around your boutique would use your own sales and inventory.

Want this for your boutique?

Ohavah can build an open-to-buy plan around your store's real numbers, so you walk into market knowing exactly what you can spend in each category. And once you've decided what to buy, Ohavah turns the supplier invoice into ready-to-sell listings in minutes.