Putting AI to Work: How I Analyzed 2,000 Wine SKUs in Minutes
I don’t just talk about AI. I use it to run my own businesses. At our liquor store, I put Claude to the test with an audit of our wine inventory.
Instead of spending days buried in spreadsheets, I gave it three pieces of data and asked it to help identify where we could improve.
The data I used
- Sales data for every wine SKU, about 2,000 items.
- Our current on-hand inventory levels.
- Statewide and nationwide wine sales trends.
What the analysis surfaced
In less than five minutes, Claude produced an inventory action plan focused on three areas.
The cash drains: overstock
It flagged slow-moving SKUs that were tying up cash we could put to work elsewhere.
The blind spots: out-of-stocks
It estimated potential missed sales from popular items being out of stock. These estimates are useful starting points, not a guarantee of what customers would have purchased.
The hidden gems: sales opportunities
Comparing our sales with statewide trends highlighted an area where we were underperforming: Sauvignon Blanc. That gave us a concrete category to investigate rather than guessing where an opportunity might be hiding.
Matching products across reports
One useful detail: Claude matched products across the reports even when their names weren’t written exactly the same way. That helped bring the files together, though product matches are worth reviewing before making purchasing decisions.
The takeaway
You don’t need a data science degree or a massive corporate budget to start asking better questions of your inventory. If you have sales and stock spreadsheets, AI can help you turn them into a practical first-pass analysis.
Review the matches, calculations, and assumptions, then use your knowledge of the business to decide what to do next.