Everything unsold becomes a loss with a date on it. Tracking what was thrown away, by line and by week, is the only way to discover that a product bought out of habit has been losing money for a year.
Purchasing is a forecast made at four in the morning. What sold last week, the weather and whether a holiday falls on a Thursday all move demand, and buying from memory produces either empty shelves or a skip.
Substitutions define the box. Something failing to arrive means every subscriber needs an alternative that week, and handling that consistently — with a note explaining why — is what keeps a subscription alive.
Trade orders compress the morning. A restaurant ordering at eleven at night for a delivery before service means picking, weighing and driving all happen in the same few hours, so those orders need to be visible the moment they arrive.