Sales by Vendor Report

Why Sales by Vendor report is important

This summary on sales shows the breakdown of revenue and expenses for products on the level of brands which your store sells.

Use the functionality of this Shopify’s reporting tool to compare the costs and revenue across brands in your store to understand better which vendor brings the most profits.

Additionally, use the summary to see progressions of sales key indicators and contrast current data with earlier time periods.

The default configuration of this report offers data on general sales of products split by its vendors. The information is offered by displaying such columns as gross sales, returns, discounts, net quantity, total sales.

When applying filters to the summary output, the data can be made more representative of your needs. For example, you can add product names, SKUs, variant names. Such information can be useful for inventory planning and marketing purposes.

What questions summary on sales by vendor can answer

This type of summary offers several benefits for online businesses. It pulls a list of sold items by breaking it down by the product brand. This gives a high-level overview of sales in the store.

The document gives detailed information on all suppliers who brought sales within the selected time range for a store. The sales data includes key metrics for further analysis. The data displayed can be used to answer such questions as:

• What is the net quantity of items sold for each vendor within the specified time period?
• See what brand brings the most sales and which one has the least sales?
• What are the key sales indicators (total, gross, net sales) for each brand within the given time range?
• How many refunds does each brand have?
• What vendors are mostly purchased by customers with discounts?
• What sums of taxes and shipping fees are referred to each brand?

Expand this list of answers by extending the report with the help of additional data columns and data filters.

Key sales indicators in a report

Using this summary gives an accurate look at the vendor’s popularity in a store, determining how each of them is performing.

Furthermore, the store managers can get additional insights by adding more data or filters to the report. Expand the summary with additional columns to get a detailed view. For example, additionally to the vendor’s name, see its products by name or SKU.

Track the number of orders, gross and net sales, total quantity within the chosen time period. Sales overview output for each sales day displays such data as:

• Net quantity
• Gross, Net sales
• Taxes
• Discounts
• Refunds

Use these columns to glance at the current sales situation for each brand in your store within the range of selected dates.

Reports similar to Sales by Vendor

A summary of vendor sales is an easy-to-view approach for getting the current status of each brand presented in the store catalog. However, the focus on sales data can be changed to another scope.

The reporting tool allows switching time periods and comparing data between selected time ranges. Furthermore, the report on sales can be generated on other factors that can be extracted from the store database.

In conjunction with the variant sales, a store manager can often use such summaries as:

• Sales by product. Displays the information on purchases for each product name or SKU.
• Sales by Product Type. Contains basic indicators such as Net Amount, Number of Orders, etc. It will help you find out what type of product is selling best.
• Sales by Vendor > Product > Variant. Similar to the Sales by Vendor report, but more detailed. The report is sorted by vendor, product and variant.
• Sales by Collection. Shows what product collections bring revenue into your store. It is another way to look at sales in a store beside the direct sales by product or sales by variant reports. Out of the box, Shopify does not provide a summary of in-store collections.
• Sales by Product Type. It is another way to focus – this time in terms of product type. Get information on what types of items have the highest sales.

Key columns for sales by vendor

Typically the table with the data on vendor sales consists of such columns as:

• ORDER ITEMS Vendor
• ORDER ITEMS Net Quantity
• ORDER ITEMS Gross Sales
• ORDER ITEMS Discounts
• REFUND ITEMS Returns
• ORDER ITEMS Net Sales
• ORDER ITEMS Tax
• ORDERS Shipping
• ORDER ITEMS Total Sales

An executive manager of the store is totally free to exclude any of the existing columns from the default configuration or add several additional ones. Simply choose available columns from the list.

Here is how some of the key columns in the default report are calculated:

• ORDER ITEMS Net Quantity. This column is calculated through the total number of ordered and refunded items.

  [ORDER ITEMS Net Quantity] = [ORDER ITEMS Total Quantity] - [REFUND ITEMS Total Quantity]

• ORDER ITEMS Gross Sales. The final column of the default report is calculated through the variant’s price and quantity.

  [ORDER ITEMS Gross Sales] = [PRODUCT VARIANTS Price] × [ORDER ITEMS Quantity]

• ORDER ITEMS Net Sales. The net sales column of the default report is calculated through gross sales, discounts, and refunds.

  [ORDER ITEMS Net Sales] = [ORDER ITEMS Gross Sales] - [ORDER ITEMS Discounts] – [REFUND ITEMS Returns]

• ORDERS Shipping. The shipping fees are obtained from the total shipping price and amount

  [ORDERS Shipping] = [ORDERS Shipping amount] - [ORDER ADJUSTMENTS Total Shipping Amount]

• ORDER ITEMS Total Sales. Get the sum of total sales calculated as:

  [ORDERS Total Sales] = [ORDERS Net Sales] + [ORDERS Shipping] + [ORDERS Tax]

Variations of Sales by Vendor report

You can get another view on sales besides the vendor sales. Using variations of the default report, you can obtain a clearer insight into the business performance of your store.

One of the easiest ways to get a glance on the business success is to compare a specific date range to previous period.

Using filters and sorting options, you can get answers to some other questions regarding sales. Here are some examples of the report variations.

How to see sales by location

You can easily see the sales data for each sale day with the data on the geographical distribution of customers.

See in provinces, cities, and countries you have the most or least purchases.

How to see customer’s lifetime value

It is well known that existing customers cost less than attracting new ones for a store. Depending on the purchases each customer makes, they set their individual value for a store.

You can easily see the customer lifetime value with the CUSTOMERS CLV data column. Use it to monitor for signs of shoppers' attrition in your store.

[ORDERS Gross Margin, %] = ([ORDERS Net Sales] - [ORDERS COGS]) ÷ [ORDERS Net Sales] × 100

[ORDER ITEMS Total Cost] = [ORDER ITEMS Quantity] × [INVENTORY ITEMS Cost] 

How to see what type of customer made the order

A store can have both new and recurring customers, the latter being preferable. Merchants can easily see what types of customers buy in their stores within the ORDERS Customer Type column.

In case the date of customer’s first order is equal to the order processing date, then the customer is considered a first-time buyer. Otherwise, they are assigned to a Returning type. If the report cannot detect the customer ID, it will display the Unknown value.

[ORDER ITEMS Total Shipping Price] = [ORDERS Shipping Price] ÷ [ORDER FACTS Quantity] × [ORDER ITEMS Quantity]

[ORDERS Total Sales] = [ORDERS Net Sales] + [ORDERS Shipping] + [ORDERS Tax]

[ORDERS Net Sales] = [ORDERS Gross Amount] - [ORDERS Discounts] - [REFUNDS Returns]

[ORDERS Shipping] = [ORDERS Shipping amount] - [ORDER ADJUSTMENTS Total Shipping Amount]

[ORDERS Tax] = [ORDERS Taxes] – [REFUND ITEMS Total Tax Amount]