Guides · Updated 2026-11-06

After Stocky: purchase orders in Shopify without another app

Stocky has stopped working and its read-only access, the window for pulling your files, ends around the end of November. Most "Stocky alternative" posts sell you another inventory app. This guide covers the other route: moving your purchase orders into Shopify's own Purchase orders, which are free and already in your admin, and what you need to add so late stock doesn't slip past you.

Short answer: export your purchase order report before the window closes (it is the only file that ties products to suppliers, prices and dates), write down what was never in any export, re-create your open POs in Shopify under Products > Purchase orders, and set up a daily check for late shipments, because Shopify won't flag them for you.

Before the window closes: what to pull

The purchase order report, all of it. Suppliers were never an export of their own, but every PO line names its supplier, so this file is how you rebuild the supplier list. It also holds your cost history with dates.
The product export, for SKUs and default costs.
Keep the original files untouched. Work on a copy. Opening the CSV in Excel and saving it again turns the long variant ID column into numbers like 4.94515E+13, and that column is the most reliable way to match a line to the right product.

What never came across (copy it by hand now)

People who have been through the exports report the same gaps. Check each one while Stocky is still readable:

supplier contact details: email, phone, address, contact name
lead times that differ from the default, per supplier or product
payment terms, minimum order quantities, notes
expected delivery dates on open POs
which open POs were partly received, and what is still to come

Put them in one spreadsheet, one column per field, before you pick a tool. Then you only type them once.

What Shopify's own Purchase orders cover

Shopify's built-in Purchase orders (Products > Purchase orders) come with Shopify at no extra cost and live in your admin, with no extra app:

Suppliers with company, address, contact name, phone, email, website and notes, so the details Stocky never exported have a proper home.
Payment terms, a reference number and a note to the supplier on each PO.
Shipments. The expected arrival date goes on each shipment when the supplier ships, not on the PO itself. A PO can have several shipments, so a delivery that arrives in two parts keeps both dates.
Receiving into the destination location, which updates your inventory.

Re-creating your open POs

You don't need to bring your whole history into Shopify. Keep the exported files as your archive and re-create only what is still open:

Create each supplier once, pasting in the contact details from your spreadsheet.
For each open PO: pick the supplier and destination, add the products, quantities and costs, set the payment terms, and use the Stocky PO number as the reference number.
When a supplier ships, add the shipment with its tracking and expected arrival date.
Anything already partly received: enter only what is still to come.

For most stores this is around ten minutes per supplier.

The gap: nobody tells you a PO is late

This is the part Stocky users notice in the first week. Shopify lists your purchase orders, but it doesn't alert you when a shipment passes its expected date, doesn't chase the supplier, and doesn't connect a late PO to the customer orders waiting on that stock. If you used to check the Stocky list every morning, that check is now yours to do.

Three ways to fill it

1. A manual morning check (free). Open Purchase orders each morning and look at anything ordered or shipped whose expected date has passed. It works, but it relies on someone remembering on busy days.

2. A daily email (free template). The Incoming Stock Tracker is an n8n workflow that reads Shopify's own purchase orders every morning and emails you what is overdue, arriving this week, partly received or not shipped yet. It needs no new app in your admin and runs on your own n8n.

3. Supplier chasing and waiting orders (Pro). Incoming Stock Tracker Pro adds draft chase emails to suppliers on late POs, an alert when an expected date moves, a weekly on-time score per supplier, and a list of wholesale orders waiting on late stock. It costs $29 once, with no monthly fee. You can watch a recorded run first.

Which route fits

A handful of suppliers and few POs a month: Shopify's Purchase orders plus the morning check, or the free template.
Wholesale orders that depend on incoming stock, or suppliers who need chasing: the Pro version.
You need demand forecasting and reorder suggestions: that is what the dedicated inventory apps are for. Shopify's Purchase orders don't forecast, and neither does our tracker.

Moving off Stocky? We'll do it for you.

We re-create your open purchase orders and suppliers in Shopify and set up the daily late-stock email, for $199 once. Before the read-only window closes.

Move us off Stocky Watch a recorded run