Why is it so hard to list your inventory?

For the 3rd time in as many weeks I've attempted to purchase personal safety equipment to race in from retailers that either support GRM or don't. I get a phone call 3-4 days later, after my card has been charged in the full amount, stating "Sorry we don't have that in stock, would this work better for you?" 

Is updating a website to reflect inventory a difficult thing to do these days? It is perplexing and frustrating. I love supporting local businesses vs. big box stores and don't mind paying a bit more to do so; but, sheeeeeeet get it together haha. 

Because racing is still a cottage industry.  I still have good results with the old telephone.  Used a wired one for the most authentic race parts ordering experience. 

Yes, a few minutes talking on the phone can save a lot of problems.

Tyler H (Forum Supporter) said:

Because racing is still a cottage industry.  I still have good results with the old telephone.  Used a wired one for the most authentic race parts ordering experience. 

The last time I did that I ended up with the wrong pieces. I like tracability. 

Yes, because having a site that can reflect inventory isn't that hard, but if you have multiple inputs, and also sell outside the site, it can wreck the ability to have real-time inventory reflected on the site. And if you are selling OPP (other people's parts) and drop shipping, then it is nearly impossible to know what the available stock is, particularly if you sell a wide range of parts from many vendors.

In reply to modernbeat :

I was just going to say, little racing suppliers are notorious for drop shipping everything and drop-ship is notorious for terrible inventory updating.

My guess is that they don't have the inventory.  So much is moving to the distribution warehouse model.  It allows them to look like they have more on hand than a cottage store could.  They go to request the drop ship and find out none is available at the moment.

Most little commerce operations don't have an integrated ERP system because of the cost and complexity. 

For example, I think our sales people (NetSuite) only target businesses with more than $5 million in annual revenue.

In addition to what z31 said:

Up until recently most web shopping carts were custom built for companies. That means a lot of maintenance and having someone on staff, or contracting someone, to maintain it. It also means you were typically version locked to whatever accounting system you had in house to maintain inventory as fields locations can change in the tables in an upgrade. A new system means a complete rewrite.

Since these carts were typically $80k+ investments, it's a huge risk. If anything goes wrong you can end up in limbo and a sunk cost.

A lot of ERP systems don't have a 1st party add-on to Shopify, Magento, Big Cartel, etc because if you put it out there your development resources are now at the mercy of that other company.

Shopify has made this easier to an extent, but a web shopping cart isn't something you just drop in.

Whoever you ordered from is probably in that limbo situation where the ERP inventory to shopping cart inventory link broke and they can't afford, or don't know how, to fix it.