Open Pantry
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Open Pantry
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LOT, EXPIRY & FEFONEW

Lot & Expiry Tracking: First-Expiry-First-Out Picking, Automatically

FEFO (first-expiry-first-out) means the stock closest to its expiry date is always sold first. Open Pantry tracks your inventory by lot and expiry date and directs pickers to the earliest-expiring lot automatically — so stock rotation happens by default, waste stops quietly accumulating, and you always know which lot went where.

  • Receive stock with lot and expiry; picking draws down the earliest-expiring lot first
  • Lot-level costs flow into your real COGS and margins
  • Built into ordering and pick & pack — not a separate ERP to buy and integrate
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★★★★★  Trusted by 600+ suppliers across Australia

Open Pantry lot and expiry tracking showing stock by lot number and expiry date with the first-expiry-first-out pick order applied automatically
Recommended by:M&J ChickensFood & Drink BusinessFoodService REPGoogle ★★★★★
Built for food & beverage wholesalersMeatSeafoodProduceDairySmallgoodsBakeryBeverages

Expiry dates don’t manage themselves

New stock gets stacked in front, old stock expires at the back — write-off by shelf position

Nobody knows which lot went to which customer until it matters — urgently

Expiring stock discovered after it’s too late to discount or move it

Lot costs vary between deliveries but your margins assume they don’t

How Lot and Expiry Tracking Works

1

Receive with lot + expiry

Incoming stock is recorded by lot with its expiry date and cost.

2

FEFO directs the pick

Pickers are pointed at the earliest-expiring lot; rotation is automatic, not a training issue.

3

Lots draw down as orders ship

Each sale decrements the specific lot picked, keeping lot-level stock true.

4

Costs follow the lot

The lot’s actual cost feeds COGS, so margins reflect what that stock really cost.

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FEFO by default

First-expiry-first-out picking is the default behaviour, not a setting buried three menus deep. Even a newer delivery with a shorter shelf life gets picked first — because FEFO follows the expiry date, not the arrival date.

Open Pantry directing a pick to the earliest-expiring lot even when a newer delivery has a shorter shelf life

Expiry visibility before it’s a write-off

See what’s approaching its use-by date while there’s still time to move it — run a special on it instead of binning it.

Open Pantry lot list highlighting stock approaching its expiry date in time to discount or move it

Lot-level cost accuracy

Different deliveries cost different amounts. Because sales draw down specific lots, your cost of goods reflects the actual lot picked — the foundation of honest margin numbers.

Two lots of the same product at different costs in Open Pantry, each drawing down at its actual cost into COGS

Part of the same platform

Lot tracking lives inside the same system as your ordering, picking and invoicing — no ERP project, no integration, no double data entry.

Lot tracking built into the same Open Pantry platform as ordering, picking and invoicing
More product lines purchased
24%
Your always-on branded store and app put your full range in front of customers, so baskets grow.
Less order-processing cost
95%
AI order capture and auto-invoicing remove the manual keying between order and books.
Fewer picking errors
80%
Tablet pick & pack with FEFO lot and expiry tracking catches shorts and wrong items before they ship.

Real gains suppliers report after moving ordering, fulfilment and invoicing onto Open Pantry.

Lot Costs Flow Into Margins and Your Books

M&J Chickens

Trusted by M&J Chickens

M&J Chickens use Open Pantry to move ordering out of calls and messages and into one digital workflow — giving customers a smooth ordering experience and giving the team fewer errors and less admin.

Alex Ortiz — Head of Sales

“With Open Pantry, we launched our own fully branded ordering app — it’s helped us protect our customer base, move to digital ordering, and deliver a much better experience to our venues.”

Alex Ortiz — Head of Sales
Alex Ortiz — Head of Sales
M&J Chickens
Get a DemoSee how their setup works →

Lot tracking shouldn’t cost more than your ordering platform

Standalone inventory ERPs do lot tracking well — for hundreds of dollars a month, plus an integration project to connect them to your ordering and invoicing. Open Pantry’s lot tracking is built into the platform your orders already run on: the pick screen, the stock pool and the invoice are all the same system, so FEFO actually happens on the warehouse floor.

A separate inventory ERP needing integration versus Open Pantry lot tracking built into the same ordering and picking platform

Questions Suppliers Ask About Lot, Expiry & FEFO

What’s the difference between FIFO and FEFO, and which should a food wholesaler use?＋
FIFO (first-in-first-out) sells the oldest received stock first; FEFO (first-expired-first-out) sells the stock with the earliest expiry date first. For perishables, FEFO is correct: a newer delivery can have a shorter shelf life than older stock, and FEFO catches that where FIFO doesn’t. Open Pantry picks FEFO by default.
How do pickers know which lot to pick?＋
The picking screen directs them. When lot tracking is on, each pick line points at the earliest-expiring lot, so correct rotation doesn’t depend on anyone reading date labels in a coolroom — it’s just what the tablet says to grab.
What happens when I receive stock — do I enter lot and expiry every time?＋
You record the lot number, expiry date and cost as stock is received. It’s seconds per delivery, and it’s the moment that makes everything downstream — FEFO, expiry alerts, lot-level costing — automatic.
Does FEFO still work if a newer delivery expires sooner than older stock?＋
Yes — that’s exactly the case FEFO exists for. Picking follows the expiry date, not the receipt order, so the short-dated newer lot goes out first.
Can I see which stock is approaching expiry?＋
Yes. Lot-level expiry visibility shows what’s getting close to its date while you can still act — discount it, feature it in a special, or prioritise it to high-volume customers.
Does lot tracking change my COGS and margins?＋
Yes, for the better. Because each sale draws down a specific lot at its actual cost, your cost of goods reflects reality when lot costs differ between deliveries — and your margin analytics inherit that accuracy.
Do I need barcode scanners for lot tracking?＋
No. Lots are managed through the same tablet workflow as picking — received, tracked and drawn down without scanning hardware.
How does lot tracking work with products I sell by carton and by each?＋
Pack sizes and lots work together: whichever unit a customer buys, the pick draws down the correct quantity from the directed lot, so lot balances stay true across mixed-size orders.
Am I required to track lot numbers as a wholesale food supplier in Australia?＋
Australian food businesses are required to be able to identify where food came from and where it went (one step back, one step forward), and wholesalers need a workable recall procedure under FSANZ requirements. Lot-level tracking is the practical way to meet that — talk to your food-safety advisor about your category’s specifics.
Can lot tracking help in a recall?＋
Yes — tracking stock in and out at lot level is the foundation of recall readiness, because it ties what you received to what you shipped. Ask us in a demo about running recall scenarios for your product categories.
Can I stop short-dated stock being sold?＋
You control what’s sellable — expiring lots can be held back, discounted or moved deliberately rather than sold by accident. FEFO already minimises the problem by making short-dated stock leave first.
What does lot and expiry tracking cost?＋
It’s part of inventory management on the Pro plan — see our pricing page. No separate module, no per-lot fees.

Works Even Better With

Digital Pick & Pack

FEFO drives the tablet pick line directly — the earliest-expiring lot, every time.

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Purchasing & Auto-POs

When lots draw down and stock runs low, Open Pantry drafts the purchase order to top it up.

Explore →

Margin & COGS Analytics

Lot-level costs feed real COGS, so gross margin reflects what that stock actually cost.

Explore →

Make Stock Rotation Happen by Default.

Join 600+ Australian suppliers running their ordering, fulfilment and invoicing on Open Pantry.

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