Skip to content

Concepts

How Ardent Seller thinks — the ideas behind the screens

Back to Documentation

Five short articles that make the rest of the app make sense

Ardent Seller has a small set of ideas it applies everywhere: stock only moves through transactions, the interface is shaped by modules, data lives at locations, costs flow as weighted averages, and every item belongs to a category that decides what it can do. These articles explain each idea once, in plain language — read them and the guides, reports, and pickers throughout the app will stop feeling arbitrary. If you are brand new, start with the Quick Start and come back here when something surprises you.

How Stock Moves

Quantities never change by themselves — every movement is a transaction, and only Completed transactions count. Learn which categories add stock, which remove it, and why a saved-but-not-completed purchase leaves your counts untouched.

Transaction Categories The Completed Rule Production Runs Transfers Opening Balances
Learn More

Setup & Modules

A two-question setup interview tailors which parts of Ardent Seller you see, and six modules group the surface area. Modules only hide the interface — your data always stays. Change your answers any time under Settings.

The Setup Interview The Six Modules Hiding vs Deleting Changing Modules Later
Learn More

Locations & Entities

Entities are your locations (studio, storage, market stall) and your contacts (vendors, customers, charities). Inventory, transactions, and recipes are scoped to the location you have selected — the single most common reason data seems to disappear.

Location Types Contacts Location Scoping The Location Switcher Transfers
Learn More

How Costing Works

Ardent Seller uses weighted-average costing everywhere: purchases set unit costs, recipes roll ingredient and labor costs up, production runs move cost into finished output, and a sale records profit against the average cost at that moment.

Weighted Average Purchases Recipe Roll-up Production COGS & Margin Opening Balances
Learn More

Sellable vs Purchasable

Ten inventory categories decide what each item can do: only Products and Services can be sold, Products and Services cannot be purchased, and finished goods and subassemblies are the intermediates in between. The full capability matrix, with maker examples.

10 Categories Capability Matrix Golden Rules Recipe Eligibility
Learn More