A broken size run is a style where the sizes still in stock are the ones few customers buy, usually the smallest and the largest, while the core sizes (M, L and sometimes XL) have sold out. The style looks unsold on the rack, but the real problem is the missing middle, and it quietly turns full-price stock into markdown stock.
Why does a broken size run hurt more than a plain stockout?
Because a plain stockout is visible and gets fixed, while a broken run looks like healthy stock. The report says 14 units on hand, so nobody reorders, yet most of those units are sizes that rarely leave the shelf.
Think of a kurta style with 14 pieces left across a store: 5 in XS, 5 in XXL, 2 in S and 2 in XL. A walk-in customer who wears M or L finds nothing and leaves, or buys a different style from a competitor down the road. The style then slows down, the store manager marks it as a slow mover, and the remaining sizes are discounted. The sizes that sold out sold at full price. The leftover sizes sell at a markdown or not at all. Your average margin on the style falls even though demand was never the problem.
The same thing happens online. A listing that shows "in stock" because one XXL remains still collects clicks, but the size selector offers the customer nothing they can wear. Either they bounce, or they pick the wrong size and the order returns. We covered the return side in cutting returns and RTO for Indian apparel stores.
How do you know a style has a broken size run?
Look at sell-through by size, not by style. If the middle sizes have sold through far faster than the edge sizes, the run is broken, whatever the style-level total says.
Most owners track a style as one line: units received, units sold, units left. That view hides the problem completely. Add three simple measures per style, per store and for the chain as a whole:
- Size-level sell-through: units sold divided by units received, shown for each size separately.
- Core size cover: how many days of sales the M and L stock will last at the current rate. When this drops below your replenishment lead time, the run is about to break.
- Run completeness: the number of sizes with at least one unit in stock, divided by the number of sizes the style was bought in. Below roughly two thirds, most customers will not find their size.
Treat these as your own operating thresholds, not industry rules. Set them from your last two seasons of sales and adjust.
Where does the missing stock actually go?
Usually it is not lost. It is sitting in the wrong store, in a warehouse bin, or in a cancelled online order nobody put back on the shelf.
When a core size is zero in one store, the chain often still has it somewhere else. Three common places:
- A slower store. The same style sold more slowly in a smaller location, so its M and L pieces are still on the rack.
- The warehouse or backroom. Stock received but not yet put away is not sellable, a pattern described in how putaway delays hide sellable stock.
- An inaccurate count. The system says zero or says five, and the shelf says otherwise. Regular counts fix this, as in cycle counting for Indian retail warehouses.
How to fix broken size runs before they turn into markdowns
You fix a broken run by rebalancing the core sizes across stores early, replenishing only the sizes that sell, and discounting only the sets that cannot be repaired. The steps below work for a single store and scale to a chain.
- Report stock and sales by style and size for every store, not by style alone, and refresh it at least weekly during the season.
- Flag every style where core size cover is shorter than your replenishment lead time, or run completeness has dropped below your threshold.
- Search the whole chain for the missing sizes: other stores, the warehouse, and stock sitting in returns or cancelled orders.
- Transfer the middle sizes from slow stores to the stores where that style sells fastest, and do it in one batch per route rather than one piece at a time. The mechanics are in real-time stock transfer for Indian apparel chains.
- Reorder only the sizes that sold out, in proportion to the size mix that actually sold last season, rather than repeating the original size ratio.
- Mark down the leftover edge sizes only once the run cannot be repaired, and do it in the stores where those sizes sell, not chain-wide.
- Hide or de-prioritise online listings whose core sizes are gone, so you do not pay for traffic that cannot convert.
What should your size mix look like when you buy?
Buy by the size mix your own sales show, not by an even split. An even split across XS to XXL almost guarantees broken runs, because customers do not buy sizes evenly.
Pull last season's sales by size for each style family and each store. Many stores will find the middle sizes make up the bulk of sales, while the extremes sell far slower, and the mix differs by city and by format. A store near a college sells a different curve from a family-led store in the same city. Use your own numbers per store, and refresh them every season. For the planning side, see seasonal demand forecasting for Indian fashion retailers.
| View | What you see | What you miss |
|---|---|---|
| Style total | 14 units left, style looks fine or slow | Which sizes those 14 units are |
| Size level, one store | M and L at zero in this store | Whether another store still has them |
| Size level, whole chain | M and L available in two other stores | Nothing: this is the view that lets you transfer |
How do transfers and GST fit in?
Moving stock between your own stores is normally simple when the stores share a registration. When stores sit under different GST registrations, the movement can count as a supply and needs the right tax invoice or delivery challan.
The rules depend on your registrations and states, so confirm the treatment with your accountant against the guidance on cbic-gst.gov.in. Build the document step into the transfer routine so staff never ship stock without it. For the wider market context of organised apparel retail, the India Brand Equity Foundation retail overview and Retailers Association of India publish regular reading.
How do you stop the same problem online?
Show one stock number per size, shared across your website, marketplaces and stores, so a size is never sold twice and never shown as available when it is gone.
If each channel keeps its own count, a size that sold out in store can stay live on a marketplace and oversell, which is the failure described in how overselling drains margin on Amazon, Flipkart and Meesho. Keep a small reserve of core sizes for your highest-margin channel, and let the rest sell everywhere from one pool. Commmerce, an Omnichannel Retail Operating System for Indian retailers, is built around that single stock view across stores, warehouse and online channels.
What should you do this week?
Pick your ten best-selling styles, list stock by size for every store, and mark the ones where M or L is at zero somewhere while available elsewhere. Transfer those pieces first. That single pass usually recovers sales you would otherwise have discounted away, and it shows you whether size-level reporting is worth building into your routine.
Do this before the next festive rush, because broken runs form fastest when demand spikes and replenishment lags. Then repeat it on a fixed day every week so the habit outlives the first clean-up.
Frequently asked questions
What is a size run in retail?
A size run is the full set of sizes a style is sold in, for example XS to XXL. A run is "broken" when key sizes are missing while others remain.
How many sizes should be in stock for a style to count as complete?
There is no universal figure. Set a threshold from your own sales, such as the share of sizes in stock needed to serve most of your customers, and track it per style and store.
Should I mark down a style with a broken size run?
Only after you have tried to repair it by transfer and reorder. Discount the leftover edge sizes in the stores where they sell, rather than cutting the price chain-wide.
