# Suggest an accounting package for my small business **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 19, 2011, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggest-an-accounting-package-for-my-small-business/582401 "2011-05-19T02:58:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2011, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggest-an-accounting-package-for-my-small-business/582401/1 "2011-05-19T02:58:27Z")
I run a small online retail business. I am currently using Quickbooks Pro 2009 for my accounting. I have no problems importing bank transactions, balancing bank ledgers and the like. However, I sell on Amazon, and maintain an inventory that currently includes 1200 items (varieties, not individual pieces) and has included just under 7000 different items since I started. I sell in excess of 1000 pieces per month. I have few repeat customers. Here comes the problem: I had been treating all individual sales on Amazon as a ‘black box’. Amazon makes a deposit into my checking account a few times a month, and I treat them as a single customer. Sales had not been linked to individual customers, and I had not been incrementing or decrementing my inventory based on individual sales. Rather, I had been accounting for inventory in a spreadsheet, and then importing the quantities from reports produced by warehouse staff as they do inventory and fill orders. Due to a desire to conform to more normal accounting practices, and advice given in the below thread, I have wanted to begin accounting for sales on a ‘per sale’ basis and handle individual sales in my accounting. > **[How do retailers calculate inventory yield?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=600596)** > > Background: I operate a small online retail operation. I order product from my wholesale suppliers. Once it arrives, I list it for sale on a couple of websites. As product sells out, I re-order from my suppliers. Due to the nature of my product,... I started the process of converting to proper inventory accounting. During the course of this research, I discovered a deal-breaker: In Quickbooks, you can only have 14,500 names Cite: [http://forums.quickbooksusers.com/archive/index.php/t-20973.html](http://forums.quickbooksusers.com/archive/index.php/t-20973.html) This means that I can only have a combined count of less than 14,500 items (types, not pieces) and customers. That pretty much guarantees that I’ll hit the limit in a few years, especially if I expand my business. I’m fine for now, since I’m not entering most sales or most items into Quickbooks. I need a grown-up accounting package. Quickbooks isn’t it. I’ve looked at PostBooks, Xero, Salesforce, and others. It’s become apparent that I can’t just switch over without substantial investment of time, and that even investigating a given option is time-consuming. Can somebody suggest a good solution? I’d like something where I can easily import my current SKU and items into the inventory database. I’d really rather not have to sit down and enter 1200 SKUs by hand. I’d also like something that can import transactions from my banks. Preferably not too expensive, but I’m not too cheap to cough up a few hundred dollars. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2011, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggest-an-accounting-package-for-my-small-business/582401/2 "2011-05-19T03:59:51Z")
I use Peachtree, I think it’s more robust than QuickBooks and I like it compared to similar products in its price range. [http://www.peachtree.com/](http://www.peachtree.com/) The version I use was $500 or so but I think you can get inventory tracking features for $300 or so, you would have to compare the features for yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Nothar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Nothar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nothar)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2011, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggest-an-accounting-package-for-my-small-business/582401/3 "2011-05-19T04:36:44Z")
You may want to look at NumberCruncher. It is an add-on inventory module that syncs and was designed to work with Quickbooks and enables you to bypass the max limits you were referring to as well as many other features. Their website is [www.numbercruncher.com](http://www.numbercruncher.com). This may be the easiest route as you would be able to keep everything as you have it and just purchase this add-on. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2011, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggest-an-accounting-package-for-my-small-business/582401/4 "2011-05-19T06:19:28Z")
Looks good on its face. It is $950, which is a punch in the gut, but I’ll put it on the list. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/suggest-an-accounting-package-for-my-small-business/582401/5 "2011-05-20T17:27:11Z")
This is my only bump, being used for the daytime crowd. BTW, I’m looking at inFlow inventory and considering having one system for inventory and another for proper accounting. Tricky stuff.