Every line, from first plan to final markdown.
Plans, buys and markdowns often live in separate spreadsheets that drift apart. MerchLayer.ai is a toolkit for e-commerce brands to plan, buy and clear from one set of numbers. It refreshes from your sales, stock and returns every night, so your team starts each morning with the rebuy sized, the size split done and the lines that need attention flagged.
Built around your brand.
- 1Forward Planning The category plan sets the first intake
- 2Line Level Buying Rebuy lands before cover runs out
- 3Sizing Buying to the correct size ratio to never leave demand unfulfilled
- 4Returns Returns are addressed early and rebuys adjusted accordingly
- 5Markdown Markdown clears it by the date
- 6Learn Audits of historical and current performance to inform future decisions
16 tools across six stages of a line's life
Each stage hands its decisions to the next, so a plan agreed in week one is the same plan your rebuy, sizing and markdown work to in week twenty. Open any tool to see what it does.
Forward Planning
Develop a data driven plan for your Merchandising team to work from.
A 26-week forecast of sales, returns, stock and intake for every category, set out as a weekly sales, stock and intake plan (WSSI). Your planners shape it, agree it, and every other tool works from that agreed version.
- Each category is forecast by whichever model tested best on its own sales history. For one client, it could be a calibrated Chronos model for Dresses and Coats, and a blend of multiple models for Tops and Shoes.
- Returns are forecast in their own right, so plans are built on net demand rather than gross sales.
- The forecasts run every night to always give you the most up-to-date information.
- Category by week, 26 weeks out.
- Feeds a rebuy budget directly, with the ability to make adjustments to the plan and see the impact across the board.
- Drafts stay private until you publish. Publishing creates a versioned plan, with every change and its reason recorded.
Line Level Buying
Rebuy what's proven, reorder what's taking off.
The budget can come from your WSSI plan, or directly from our forecasts. The recommendations spend the budget line by line. Each one shows the evidence behind it, from the sales history to the arithmetic behind the quantity.
- Quantities rounded to minimum order and scored for confidence. Lines the budget can't reach are shown as deferred, not hidden.
- Each line shows 26 weeks of sales, the forecast range ahead and the sum behind the suggested quantity.
- Lead times and cover come from your own business rules.
- Take a line out of rebuy (trend over, re-sourced, seasonal) and we won't show it again, until you reinstate it for consideration.
- Ranked on the share of launch stock cleared each week, so a three-week-old style competes fairly with a nine-week-old one.
- Shows a forecast return rate and a size split for the first reorder.
- Finds each style's real six-week peak in the data, not a fixed calendar window.
- Identification of seasonal peaks at a line level, to ensure we are prepared in plenty of time that demand can be met.
- One buy date per intake method, so you can see the trade-off between cost and speed.
Sizing
Buy the sizes customers actually want.
Size curves measured honestly, including for styles that have never sold. A size that sold out early won't look less popular than it was.
- Demand is measured over the weeks each size was actually in stock, which removes the bias a sold-out size would otherwise create.
- Styles with thin history borrow strength from similar products.
- The split respects supplier constraints and flags broken size runs.
- Built from similar products using machine learning, not just category averages.
- Choose the size range and get the split.
Returns
Find the lines that need you this week.
Triage across the live range, so your team spends its time on the handful of lines that need a decision, not the thousands that don't.
- No need to wait until your returns window expires to check how your products are returning.
- Our ML Models can predict your returns rate within hours of the days trading closing.
- Rates are forecast from similar products using machine learning, rather than falling back on category averages.
- New lines get a forecast rate before their returns have had time to come back.
- At the point of raising newness - we can calculate a tailored returns rate for that product, which can be used to stop over-buying.
- Rates use a matured window, so the most recent weeks don't look better than they are.
Markdown
The lowest discount that still clears by your date.
Markdown recommendations that weigh sell-through against margin, stay inside your guardrails and carry the decision through to every market file.
- Refreshed daily, sorted by the stock at stake.
- Built in accordance to your clearance rules, highlighting slow movers and taking pro-active action.
- Set to clear by your end-of-season date.
- Works on the candidate list or any codes you paste, and both are priced the same way.
- Prices rounded to the nearest 25p.
- Risk scoring and a sell-through simulation for each line.
- See depth, sell-through and margin side by side before you decide.
- Entering sale pricing for a line should be a last resort, we can help you identify lines at risk early.
- Changing the RRP of a product, rather than having to heavily discount gives lines a second chance to perform, without totally compromising margin.
Learn
Insights and deep dives into current and historical performance.
Understand how your range has performed in the past and identify opportunities for improvement.
- In-depth audits of historical performance, so you can see what worked and what didn't.
- Analysis of the impact of your decisions, to help shape future decisions.
- AI suggested insights and recommendations, so you can focus on the most important actions to take.
- Purpose built visualisations highlighting current performance, enabling real-time insights and decision-making.
- AI assisted action suggestions, so you can get clear direction on next steps to take.
- Market context of your own range, so you can see how your direct competitors are trading and what they are doing differently.
- Line level product comparisons of like-for-like products, so you can benchmark your range against the sector as a whole.
Built to be trusted
Every recommendation can be checked, changed or overruled by your team.
Your team makes the call
Recommendations arrive ready to approve, adjust or skip. The tools do the arithmetic; your merchandisers and buyers decide.
Every decision on record
What was suggested, what was decided, by whom and how quickly. The log only ever grows, so it can be audited.
It shows its working
Forecast ranges behind every rebuy, the sum behind every quantity, flags written in plain language, and a commercial write-up on request.
See the trade-off before you take it.
Trading markdown is a constant balance between clearing the stock and worrying about the margin impact of doing so. The tools simulate every depth for every line, then recommend the lowest one that clears by your date without breaking your floor. Try it on one dress.
Leaves 490 units behind: 59% sell-through against an 85% target.
Illustrative figures. The live tool learns each line's response from your history and applies your category's own targets, caps and floors.
Black Mini Dress
- Sold by week 8
- 59%
- Margin at this price
- 68%
- Units left over
- 490
Shaped around your brand
Each tool is built to your brief, and handles multiple levels of hierarchy, markets and settings. If your taxonomy is thin, we can build one with you.
Your hierarchy, in your words
Tell us which columns hold your range and product group, and every tool speaks your language.
| Brand | Range | Product group |
|---|---|---|
| Male Fashion | Tall | Jeans |
| Female Fashion | Activewear | Leggings |
| Teen Fashion | 13-14 Years Old | Tops |
| Your brand | Your range column | Your product group |
Your settings
Lead times by country of origin, plus the guardrails your business works to, like margin floors, discount caps and clearance dates, set and edited by your own team.
Your markets
Markdown pricing for any market, each priced through its own discount mapping and price floor.
Only the tools you want
Each tool is switched on per client, so you can start with rebuy or markdown and add the rest later.
Your numbers stay yours
Every request is scoped to your brand. Your brand's results are never shared or referenced with another client.
From first chat to first recommendation
A staged rollout, so your team can trust the numbers before relying on them.
Intro chat
We walk through how your team plans, buys and clears today, and agree which tools would help first.
Map your data
We point the tools at your data sources, and map your hierarchy.
Calibrate
We test the forecast on each of your categories to choose its model, and your team sets lead times and buy cover.
Run alongside
The tools run on your data next to your current process, so your team can compare before switching over.
Go live
Your brand's custom-built platform is live and ready to roll out to all your users.
Questions brands ask first
Will it replace my merchandisers' judgement?
No. It does the arithmetic and surfaces the lines worth looking at; your team decides. Planners shape the forecast, buyers approve the buys, and every decision is recorded.
Is our commercial data safe?
Your data is used only for your own brand's tools and is never shared with, or referenced for, another client. Every request carries a single client, and every client's data and settings are kept separate. Access is limited to our founders.