Running out of film mid-install is one of the worst operational failures a shop has. Customer is on-site, the car is half-stripped, and you're scrambling for the right shade. Low-stock alerts prevent this once you've set thresholds — here's how they actually work today.
Step 1 — Make sure your items and film products are tracked
Inventory → Items (for general stock — bottles, tools, consumables) and the film-product records under Inventory (for rolls) are where each SKU lives, with:
- Name (e.g., "Suntek CXP 35 Ceramic 40-inch")
- Unit (linear feet, each, etc. depending on item type)
- Current on-hand quantity, tracked from your rolls/usage and item transactions
- A reorder threshold, set per item or per film product
If you don't have items set up yet, see Film roll inventory.
Step 2 — Set reorder thresholds
On the Inventory page, each item row has an inline "Set alert threshold" control (it lights up once a threshold is armed), and each film product has its own Reorder point field (plus Par and Max stock levels) in its detail editor. Pick a threshold that reflects your real lead time. Formula:
Reorder threshold = (average daily usage) × (lead time in days) × 1.5 safety factor
Example: a 40-inch ceramic roll you cut from at ~8 linear feet/day, with a 7-day supplier lead time:
8 × 7 × 1.5 = 84 linear feet remaining → alert
So when the roll drops below 84 ft, it shows up as a low-stock alert.
Step 3 — Check the Alerts page: two separate cards
Inventory → Alerts isn't one alert list — it's two independent cards stacked on the page, and they read different data. They can legitimately disagree with each other, and that's expected, not a bug.
Low stock alerts (top card) lists every item and film product with a threshold armed on the Reorder points tab that's currently below it — on-hand quantity, threshold, and how far short you are, with a badge showing the total count. There's a "Dismiss" action per row if you want to clear one without ordering (e.g. you know a shipment is already in transit). This card, and its underlying reorder-points table, is also what the automated email checks below actually watch.
Film roll alerts (the card right below it) is a separate, roll-specific view keyed off each film product's own roll reorder point — the one set on that product's Overview tab, not the Reorder points tab table the card above reads. For each product it shows remaining feet across active rolls, how many rolls are active, and either "reorder at X ft" or "no reorder point set." A product with zero rolls on hand shows a red "OUT" badge even if it has no reorder point configured at all — you can't cut film you don't have, threshold or not; anything below threshold but not fully out gets an amber badge instead. Each row has a "Receive roll" button linking to the roll-intake form (it doesn't pre-fill the product — you pick it there).
Because the two cards read different sources, a film product can be fine on one and flagged on the other, or the other way round. Don't assume the two will match, and don't treat one as a subset of the other.
Sweep: show anything under [N] ft of film left. The Film roll alerts card also has a manual override control above the list. Type a number of feet and it re-queries ignoring every product's configured threshold, showing anything under that number instead — useful for an ad hoc "what's actually low today" check that doesn't depend on any threshold being set correctly (or set at all). It's a display-time override only: it does not touch or save over any product's configured reorder point. A "Clear sweep" button appears once you type a number, taking you back to each product's own threshold.
SalesThumb already pushes some of this to you by email — you don't have to remember to check the page. Every morning your shop's registered email gets a digest of everything currently below its reorder point, and a separate hourly check emails you the first time an item crosses its threshold (re-notifying at most once every 24 hours per item while it stays low). This email coverage runs off the same Reorder points table as the Low stock alerts card above — it does not cover the Film roll alerts card's roll-level thresholds. If you only ever set a reorder point on a film product's Overview tab and never arm anything on the Reorder points tab, that product running low will show up on the Film roll alerts card but will not trigger an email. There's no SMS option, no way to add extra recipients, and no way to tune the frequency today — it always goes to whatever email is on your shop profile.
Step 4 — Draft a PO straight from low stock
For film specifically, the low-stock panel on your dashboard has a "Draft PO from these" button — it generates a draft purchase order with one line per below-threshold film product, sized to bring you back up to roughly 2x your reorder threshold. This draws on the same per-product roll reorder point as the Film roll alerts card above, not the Reorder points tab table. You still review and send the PO to your supplier yourself; SalesThumb doesn't have a live API connection to any supplier (XPEL, Suntek, and other brand names you'll see in the app are catalog/placeholder text, not a wired integration), so there's no auto-submitted order and no pre-filled link on the supplier's own site.
Tips
- Start with your top 10 SKUs. Don't alert on every single specialty film. Focus on the rolls you cut from every week.
- Don't expect the two Alerts cards to always agree. Low stock alerts and Film roll alerts read different threshold sources on purpose — check both if you want the full picture, especially before assuming email silence means nothing is low.
- Review thresholds quarterly. Usage patterns drift. The threshold that worked in Q1 might be too low in Q3 if your volume grew.
- Set higher thresholds for hard-to-reorder SKUs. Specialty colors, discontinued rolls, niche imports — pad the safety factor.
- Use the sweep for a gut-check, not as your daily workflow. It's a manual, one-off override for "what's actually low right now" — it doesn't save anywhere, so it won't help you if you forget to run it.
- Don't alert on consumables you can grab at Home Depot. Squeegees, paper towels, isopropyl — the alert noise isn't worth it.