What Is Dead Stock? How to Calculate It (With Formula) and Free Up the Capital

What Counts as Dead Stock?

Dead stock is any item that hasn't sold in a defined period — commonly 30, 90, or 180 days — while still sitting in your inventory as paid-for capital. It isn't just old or damaged goods. A perfectly good item that simply isn't moving is dead stock too, and it's quietly costing you money every day it sits there.

The Dead Stock Formula

Dead Stock Value = Σ (Unsold Units × Cost Price per Unit), for every item with zero sales in your chosen period.

Run this per item, then sum across your inventory to get your total stuck capital.

A Worked Example

Say you're checking for 90-day dead stock:

Item

Units unsold (90 days)

Cost price

Dead stock value

Product A

40

₹150

₹6,000

Product B

15

₹800

₹12,000

Product C

60

₹90

₹5,400

Total dead stock across just these three items: ₹23,400 — capital that's been sitting untouched for three months.

Why Dead Stock Quietly Kills Retail Margins

Every rupee tied up in unsold stock is a rupee you can't put toward a fast-moving item instead. Beyond the opportunity cost, dead stock often carries real storage cost, and for perishable or trend-sensitive categories, a shrinking resale value the longer it sits. Most shop owners underestimate their dead stock because it's spread thin across hundreds of SKUs — no single item looks alarming on its own.

How to Find It Without a Manual Shelf Count

Doing this by hand means cross-referencing your last sale date for every single item against your current stock count — realistic for a handful of SKUs, painful for a full store. The practical approach is a sales-velocity report that flags anything with zero movement past your chosen threshold automatically. KOSH's Dead Stock Report does exactly this, checking 30/90/180-day windows and calculating the total stuck capital per item without a manual count.

What to Do Once You've Found It

• Bundle or discount slow movers with fast-selling items to clear them without a straight price cut
• Return to supplier where your purchase terms allow it
• Run a clearance window for genuinely stuck stock rather than let it sit indefinitely
• Stop reordering the same quantities of anything that's shown up on this list twice

Make This a Habit, Not a One-Time Check

Dead stock isn't a problem you solve once — new items become dead stock every month as trends shift. Running this report monthly, rather than during an annual stock-take, is what actually keeps capital moving instead of sitting on a shelf.