COGS & Expense Tracking

Overview

Accurate profitability requires knowing what your inventory costs. Verbstack lets you set COGS (cost of goods sold) at the listing level or by category, and track business expenses through the Cashflow surface, all feeding into the P&L engine.

Requires Starter plan or higher

COGS and expense tracking are available on Starter, Growth, Pro, Scale, and Enterprise plans. Cashflow planning (with the expense Configure drawer) is available on Growth and above. During your 14-day trial, all features are unlocked.

Setting COGS

Per listing

On the Listings page, click any COGS cell to enter the cost for that specific item. This gives you the most accurate profit calculations.

By category

Under Settings > P&L Defaults, set a default cost percentage or flat amount for each category. Any listing without a specific COGS value will use its category default.

Via CSV import

For bulk updates, import a CSV file with listing IDs and costs. Navigate to Settings > Imports and use the COGS import template.

Which method to use?

Start with category-level COGS for a quick overview, then refine with per-listing costs for your highest-value items. CSV import is best for backfilling large inventories.

Expense tracking via Cashflow

Expenses are managed inside the Profit > Cashflow surface (Growth and above). Click Configure to open the expense drawer, where you can add and categorize:

  • Direct expenses: Costs tied to specific products or product lines (raw materials, packaging, per-item shipping)
  • Indirect expenses: Recurring overhead like storage, software subscriptions, or rent
  • One-time expenses: Equipment purchases, marketing spend, professional services. Verbstack allocates these across the periods you specify.

Each expense uses a configurable cost basis (per-order, per-month, or fixed) that controls how it's distributed across your P&L and cashflow views.

P&L defaults

Under Settings > P&L Defaults, configure:

  • Default COGS method: Category-based or per-listing
  • Expense categories: Add or rename categories to match your bookkeeping