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METRC Starting Inventory
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Written by Treez Admin
Updated over 8 months ago
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What is a starting inventory?

When Metrc first comes online and annual licenses are still being issued throughout the supply chain, Metrc will be an “open” system for a limited time. This means, inventory items won’t be required (or able) to be tracked from seed-to-sale quite yet. Instead, retailers will be responsible for uploading their ‘starting inventory’ which will reflect all of the items they currently have on-hand in their shop.

After the annual licenses have all been awarded, Metrc will shift to a “closed-loop” system, which will require products to originate from the properly licensed entity. For example, retailers will no longer be able to create inventory out of thin air (as is the case with your starting inventory), and instead, inventory coming from a licensed distributor will already have an existing manifest in Metrc and simply need to be “received”.

What items are considered part of my starting inventory?

Your starting inventory is made up of all cannabis products in your dispensary at the time you start using Metrc. Be sure to include any new incoming inventory dropped off up until the time of the switchover. However, you won't include any merchandise products (such as rolling papers or t-shirts) in your starting inventory because Metrc doesn't track non-cannabis products.

How do I distinguish starting inventory from ongoing inventory?

There are special requirements for your starting inventory in Metrc. When you create a new package of inventory in Metrc, you must associate this package with an Item so the system knows what the package is made up of.

All Items assigned to Metrc packages in starting inventory must be identified with a reference to starting inventory in the Item name so the state can differentiate between what was part of this beginning inventory and what was brought in as ongoing additions after the transition. When Treez uploads all your products into Metrc as Items, they'll all follow the naming convention "SI - Valhalla Tangerine Sativa Gummies 10pk 100mg" and be associated with the inventory you have on-hand. The "SI" in front of all your products is what fulfills this requirement.

These Metrc items should only be assigned to the starting inventory packages, and we recommend deactivating these Items in Metrc once you've sold through each one's starting inventory units. (Note: You cannot deactivate an Item in Metrc with active inventory associated with it so you'll need to wait until your starting inventory of an Item is completely sold through.)

Any inventory that comes in after the switch will need to be associated with a separate Metrc Item that doesn't have the starting inventory designation in its name. To save you the time it would take to create these non-starting inventory versions, our upload also creates an item for each of your products that you can use moving forward. These are simply named "Valhalla Tangerine Sativa Gummies 10pk 100mg".

What should I do if I forgot to include a shipment of product onsite that should have been part of my starting inventory but wasn't?

Any inventory in your store's possession at the time of your switch onto Metrc is considered your starting inventory. We'll provide you a sheet to import your inventory, but if you accidentally leave products off, you can still create these manually in Metrc afterward. If this Item doesn't yet exist in your Metrc portal, you'll need to first create the Starting Inventory Item (and for some product categories, Strain) in Metrc, and then create a Starting Inventory package. If the Metrc Item is already created in your Metrc portal, you'll only need to create the Starting Inventory Package. You can follow the instructions below to create all these in Metrc.

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