How to Track Vinyl Inventory by Roll in Wraptor (and Stop Running Out Mid-Job)

To track vinyl inventory by roll, give every roll on your rack a record with its width, length, and what you paid, set a minimum that tells you when to reorder, and deduct film against the job that used it instead of counting the rack at month-end. In Wraptor, rolls live under Shop → Inventory → Material; each job's estimated square footage plus a 15% production allowance becomes its material need, and stock is reserved, deducted, and reconciled to the panels you actually printed as the job moves through stages you choose. On Wraptor Shop, and during the free trial, you can also track each physical roll and remnant, so you know whether one piece is long enough for a hood before you promise the job.

The short version

• •Count by the job, not by the month. Every deduction is tied to a job, so film cost per job and days until reorder come from real usage.
• •Stock vinyl and laminate in square feet. Wraptor's availability check adds up square feet; rolls or linear feet on the shelf aren't converted for it.
• •Let your stages move the stock. Pick a check stage, a deduct stage, and an optional reconcile stage once, under Settings → Workflow.
• •Set a minimum on every roll you reorder. Min Stock drives the LOW badge, the Low Stock filter, and Reorder low stock in Purchasing.
• •Receive on the purchase order. One step raises the shelf count, updates the unit cost your quotes use, and books the expense.
• •Pieces and remnants need Wraptor Shop. The stock rack, job deductions, and purchasing work on every plan; per-roll pieces and cost-drift alerts are Wraptor Shop and up.

Why roll-level tracking matters

Film is the material line that leaks quietly. When stock lives in someone's head or a month-end spreadsheet, three problems follow.

• •You don't know what the film cost on the job. Wraptor's margin numbers price material at the item's cost per unit times the quantity deducted on that job, so a job that never deducted stock reads as pure profit.
• •You reorder too late. Find out you're short when the installer pulls the roll and you lose the bay-day, not just the film.
• •Waste stays invisible. The gap between the quote's estimate and what you printed (recuts, reprints, loose nesting) only shows when you record both. The shop-floor fixes are in how to reduce vinyl waste.

A running total can't solve a fourth problem: forty square feet of gloss black might be one usable piece or four strips too narrow for a hood. Piece tracking answers that one.

Bottom line: deduct by the job and the same records give you film cost, reorder timing, and waste.

Step 1: Add your films and rolls

1. 1.Open Shop → Inventory and stay on the Material tab.
2. 2.Click Add Roll. Search the catalog for your brand and product and pick it, or choose Enter manually.
3. 3.Check the SKU, category, brand, product, color, finish, roll width, and length.
4. 4.Enter the quantity on hand, Cost per Roll ($), and a Min Stock threshold. Wraptor works out the per-unit cost from the roll cost.
5. 5.Fill in Preferred Vendor, Supplier SKU, and your supplier's reorder link for anything you buy again.
6. 6.Save. The roll lands in its color-family group on the rack with a fill gauge.

Vinyl, Laminate, PPF, Window Tint, and Specialty live on the Material tab; tape, blades, and cleaners go on Supplies. Three setup choices pay off later:

• •Use square feet for films. The availability check compares square feet. Usage can still come off a roll counted in feet when its width is set: 345 sq ft comes off a 60" roll as 69 ft.
• •Set a Charge Price. Left blank, quotes price that material at twice its cost.
• •Keep a laminate item, even at zero, if you laminate. A layer you don't stock isn't checked.

To skip the typing, Smart import from PDF on the Material tab turns a supplier cost sheet or your own price sheet into inventory rows for one AI credit; you review every row before Apply N items, and re-importing a newer sheet updates matching items in place. Which films to carry is its own decision; the vehicle wrap materials guide compares the major brands. The color library under WrapStudio → Colors is for design and matching, separate from physical stock.

Tie your rate card to the rack

Quoting and stock meet on the film. Open Money → Quote Settings → Materials, labor & add-ons → Wrap → Add film:

1. 1.Use Choose vinyl from inventory to pick the exact stocked roll (check the SKU when several share a product name) and Laminate (optional) for its laminate.
2. 2.Enter Width (in), Length (ft), and Cost per roll, then press Save roll cost. The panel shows the roll's area and cost per square foot: a 60-inch by 150-foot roll is 750 sq ft, so at $750 it costs $1 per sq ft.
3. 3.Set Charge for vinyl / sq ft and Charge for laminate / sq ft, then press Add film.

On an existing film, Roll cost & stock does the same, so the film shows live stock and real margin. Saving a roll cost never adds stock; stock arrives through Inventory and Purchasing. The full walkthrough is in Quote setup.

Bottom line: a roll record with a real cost and a minimum is the foundation; everything below reads from it.

Step 2: Pick the stages that check, deduct, and reconcile

Open Settings → Workflow, find Material tracking ("Confirm, deduct, and reconcile inventory automatically as jobs move"), and choose a stage for each step. Changing them needs the Settings permission.

For a printed wrap, that might mean checking when the job is scheduled, deducting when it goes to print, and reconciling once the wrap is on. The deduction runs however the job enters the stage, whether from the board, the calendar, the installer's Advance button, or Rex. If a job moves back out, Material Used? asks whether to Return to Stock or leave it as Already Used.

Bottom line: set the three stages once and the board does the counting.

Step 3: Deduct film against each job

A job's need is its estimated square footage (from the approved quote, or typed on the job) plus a 15% production allowance. The job's Materials tab shows it as Estimated Need: Required, With Waste (15%), Vinyl Available, and Laminate Available. If that block is missing, the job has no estimated square footage yet.

1. 1.Move the job into your check stage. In Confirm Materials, set the amount for each roll, add anything missing, and press Confirm & Advance. The roll card now reads N avail · N reserved.
2. 2.Move the job into your deduct stage. Wraptor takes the stock off and records the usage against the job.
3. 3.After printing, move the job into your reconcile stage. Under Panels printed (includes reprints), enter Panels, Width (in), Height (in), and Waste %. Wraptor shows Actual used, the linear feet off the roll, and Variance vs reserved.
4. 4.Add a Note (optional) such as "1 reprint due to bubble" and press Confirm & Move. Stock moves up or down to match what you actually printed.

Vinyl and laminate each take the full printed area, because a laminated wrap uses about the same amount of each. For jobs that don't follow the board, the job's Materials tab has Record Vinyl Usage, Record Laminate Usage, and Add from Rack, and that tab is never permission-gated, so installers without Inventory access can log their own material.

To see trouble early, watch for the dot on a job's Materials tab ("Not enough material in stock") and use Sort → Material on the Jobs board to bring short jobs to the top. Once deductions run, the tab's Estimate vs actual strip shows planned and used square feet and the cost difference.

Bottom line: the approved quote sets the need, the stages move the stock, and reconcile turns the estimate into what really came off the roll.

Step 4: Track individual rolls and remnants (Wraptor Shop)

1. 1.On a roll card, click Track pieces →.
2. 2.Under Add pieces, enter Length (ft), Width (in), and Count, ticking Remnant / offcut for offcuts. Press Add, and repeat for every piece of that SKU on the rack.
3. 3.When the variance row shows pieces and ledger disagree, press Sync ledger to set the on-hand figure to the sum of the pieces.

Until you press Sync ledger, the running total stays the source of truth. From then on, recording usage adds a Which piece? step, the piece you cut from becomes a remnant, and the list view's Longest piece column answers "can we do the hood from what's on the rack?"

Per-roll pieces need Wraptor Shop or above; below Shop, Track pieces → opens an upgrade panel. Receiving a film line on a purchase order records the pieces on every plan, so they're waiting if you upgrade.

Step 5: Catch low stock before the install

Wraptor flags low stock wherever you look at the rack:

• •Roll cards at or below Min Stock carry a LOW badge, and empty ones OUT; the Material strip counts low and critical rolls.
• •The Low Stock toggle on the Material and Supplies tabs filters to items at or under their minimum.
• •Each roll's detail page (click its name in list view) has a Stock Analysis card with Days Until Reorder, a Reorder Soon badge when it's close, and Usage (last 90 days) by week.
• •The Reorder low stock button in Purchasing carries an amber badge counting items at or under their minimum.

One rule catches people: an item with its minimum left at 0 is never suggested for reorder, however empty the shelf is.

Step 6: Reorder and receive on purchase orders

1. 1.Open Shop → Purchasing and click Reorder low stock. Wraptor drafts orders from everything at or under its minimum, grouped by Preferred Vendor, with quantities that restock to twice the minimum.
2. 2.Uncheck anything you don't want, adjust quantities, and press Create Draft Order (or Create N Draft Orders).
3. 3.Open the draft and press Send to Vendor to email a shop-branded PDF with the supplier's part numbers, or Mark Ordered for a phone or portal order.
4. 4.When the delivery arrives, press Receive Items on the order, enter what arrived per line (or Fill remaining), and read the preview: "Books $X to Expenses (Material)".
5. 5.Leave the unit-cost box ticked to update each item's cost to this order's price, which feeds quoting, then confirm.

Stock goes up, the expense lands in Money → Expenses, and a partial delivery leaves the order Partially received until the rest comes. Fix mistakes on the purchase order itself, because an expense a PO booked can't be deleted from Expenses. For a roll bought without a PO, use Adjust Stock → Add Stock and tick Log this as a purchase. Details are in the Purchasing manual.

Bottom line: order from the low-stock list and receive on the PO, and the shelf, the cost, and the expense ledger agree without retyping.

What's on which plan

New shops start on a Wraptor Shop trial, so pieces and remnants are open from day one. The Inventory and Purchasing tabs need the Inventory permission, which the Manager and Production roles hold by default. More detail is in the Inventory manual and on the inventory feature page.

Put your rack in Wraptor

Add the five rolls you use most, set a minimum on each, pick your deduct stage, and run your next job through it; by the end of the week you'll know what that film really cost. Start a 7-day free trial at wraptor.app/trial, with no card required, or book a demo to see roll tracking on your own rack.

FAQ

What is the best way to track vinyl inventory in a wrap shop? Record each roll with its width, length, cost, and a reorder minimum, then deduct film against the job that used it instead of counting the rack at month-end. In Wraptor, jobs deduct stock when they reach the stage you choose, so film cost per job and reorder timing come from the same records.

Should I track vinyl in square feet or linear feet? Use square feet for vinyl and laminate in Wraptor. The availability check adds up square feet on hand and does not convert rolls or linear feet. Usage can still come off a roll counted in feet when its width is set, and Wraptor converts the amount for you.

How does Wraptor know how much vinyl a job needs? It takes the job's estimated square footage, from the approved quote or a figure typed on the job, and adds a 15 percent production allowance. That figure is what Wraptor reserves, compares against your stock, and deducts. After printing, the reconcile step adjusts stock to the panels you actually printed, reprints included.

Can Wraptor track individual rolls and remnants? Yes, on Wraptor Shop and above, and during the trial. Each SKU can list every full roll and offcut with its length and width, and the longest piece shows on the rack. On Wraptor Starter, the stock rack, job deductions, and purchasing still work, and received rolls are recorded as pieces for later.

How do I get warned before I run out of vinyl? Set a Min Stock on every roll you reorder. Rolls at or under it show a LOW badge, appear under the Low Stock filter, and are counted on the Reorder low stock button in Purchasing. Each roll's Stock Analysis also shows Days Until Reorder from your real usage.

Can installers log material without inventory access? Yes. Recording what a job used from the job's Materials tab works for anyone who can open the job, so an installer logs their own usage without the Inventory permission. The Inventory tab itself is open by default to the Manager and Production roles.

Manual: Inventory · Purchasing · Quote setup · Quotes · Colors