Method and system for excess inventory management

A method for managing excess inventory, comprising:

• receiving a physical shipment of goods;
• submitting a description and expiration date of each inventory item in the physical shipment of goods to an inventory management application, wherein the inventory management application tracks number of units of each inventory item at the merchant;
• and
• at a predefined timeframe prior to the expiration date:
• receiving a notification when a forecast of the number of unit of an inventory item remaining in the inventory at the expiration date is greater than a pre-defined threshold,
• selecting a buyer network of a plurality of buyer networks for selling the inventory item to generate a selected buyer network, and
• selling the inventory item via the selected buyer network.

A system for managing excess inventory, comprising:

• an inventory management application executing on a processor and configured to:
• obtain a description of an inventory item in an inventory of a merchant, a number of units of the inventory item, and an expiration date for the inventory item,
• track sales of the inventory item by reducing a number of units of the inventory item according to the sales, and
• notify, at a first predefined timeframe prior to the expiration date, the merchant of the expiration date when a forecast of the number of unit of the inventory item remaining in the inventory is greater than a pre-defined threshold;
• and
• a merchant transaction application executing on the processor and configured to:
• present the merchant with a plurality of buyer networks for selling the inventory item,
• receive, from the merchant, a selection of a first buyer network of the plurality of buyer networks to obtain a first selected buyer network, and
• offer, at the first predefined timeframe prior to the expiration date, the inventory item for sale on the first selected buyer network.

A computer readable storage medium comprising computer readable program code embodied therein for causing a computer system to perform a method for managing excess inventory, the method comprising:

• obtaining a description of an inventory item in an inventory of a merchant, a number of units of the inventory item, and an expiration date for the inventory item;
• tracking sales of the inventory item by reducing a number of units of the inventory item in inventory according to the sales;
• notifying, at a first predefined timeframe prior to the expiration date, the merchant when a forecast of the number of units of the inventory item remaining at the expiration date in the inventory is greater than a pre-defined threshold;
• and
• referring the merchant to a merchant transaction system, wherein the merchant transaction system comprises functionality to:
• present the merchant with a plurality of buyer networks for selling the inventory item,
• receive, from the merchant, a selection of a first buyer network of the plurality of buyer networks to obtain a first selected buyer network, and
• offer, at the first predefined timeframe prior to the expiration date, the inventory item for sale on the first selected buyer network.

A computer readable storage medium comprising computer readable program code embodied therein for causing a computer system to perform a method for managing excess inventory, the method comprising:

• receiving a physical shipment of goods;
• submitting a description and expiration date of each inventory item in the physical shipment of goods to an inventory management application, wherein the inventory management application tracks number of units of each inventory item at the merchant;
• and
• at a predefined timeframe prior to the expiration date:
• receiving a notification when a forecast of the number of unit of an inventory item remaining in the inventory at the expiration date is greater than a pre-defined threshold,
• selecting a buyer network of a plurality of buyer networks for selling the inventory item to generate a selected buyer network, and
• selling the inventory item via the selected buyer network.