When your business outgrows spreadsheets

Ardent Seller. Inventory software for makers ready to grow.

Ardent Seller is web-based inventory, production, and sales software from Ardent Workshop LLC for small-batch makers. It connects raw materials, recipes, finished stock, sales, and costs when your business outgrows spreadsheets.

Visit Ardent Seller (opens in new tab) Watch the video Free Forever Plan
— Whatever You Make 0:31
Play

Whatever you make · Ingredients · Batches · Profit Watch on YouTube (opens in new tab)

A workbook is a good place to understand your numbers. Ardent Seller becomes useful when every purchase, batch, and sale needs to update the same records. Choose based on the work you need to do.

How a Workshop workbook and Ardent Seller support a maker business
Your workWorkshop workbookArdent Seller
Pricing and planning Work through costs and scenarios in a file you control. Use recorded purchases and sales to track costs and margins.
Stock and batches Keep quantities and production records up to date in your workbook. Production consumes recipe materials and adds finished stock.
People and places Share a file and coordinate how your team updates it. Give users access to inventory across multiple locations.
Online orders Enter or import sales into your workbook. Connect Etsy, Shopify, or Square to import orders and keep stock in step.

Still deciding? Read the full spreadsheet-versus-software comparison, or explore workbooks for makers.

The product list puts stock quantities, average costs, selling prices, and channel tags together. Public demo data from Ardent Seller.

Open full-size screenshot
Ardent Seller product inventory showing candle and soap quantities, average unit costs, selling prices, and channel tags

A candle assembly combines a finished candle, jar, and label, with quantities and costs for each input. The recipe can be used to create production. Public demo data from Ardent Seller.

Open full-size screenshot
Ardent Seller candle recipe detail showing a candle subassembly, mason jar, label, ingredient quantities, and line costs

Start with wax, fragrance, jars, and wicks in inventory. Define the quantities for one candle in a recipe, then run a batch of 24. Production deducts the inputs and adds the finished candles. Record a sale of six and 18 remain from that batch.

For a simplified example, if the batch costs $144, each candle carries $6 of cost. Selling six at $18 records $108 in revenue and $36 in cost of goods sold, leaving $72 before marketplace fees and other expenses. These are illustrative numbers, not the screenshot values or a promise of profit.

Connect the places you already sell. Online orders and register sales arrive as sales against your inventory, so your sales records and costs give you a clearer view of what each order earned.

  • Etsy: Import orders with transaction, processing, and shipping fees broken out, and turn on inventory push per listing so stock counts flow back to Etsy. Explore the Etsy integration
  • Shopify: Import paid orders as sales and keep stock in step at every store location, with inventory push you turn on per store or per listing. Explore the Shopify integration
  • Square: Bring in register and Square Online sales from markets, pop-ups, and counters, with Square processing fees booked as expenses. Explore the Square integration

All three are included on every plan, side by side in one integrations hub. Each connection counts toward your plan's connected-shop limit.

Etsy is a trademark of Etsy, Inc. Shopify is a trademark of Shopify Inc. Square is a trademark of Block, Inc. Ardent Seller uses the Etsy, Shopify, and Square APIs but is not endorsed or certified by Etsy, Inc., Shopify Inc., or Block, Inc.

Import an invoice or receipt to draft a purchase or expense, or photograph a handwritten craft-fair tally sheet or paper order form and let Snap-a-Sale draft the sale against your catalog. Get pricing suggestions based on your costs and margins, or draft an Etsy listing from your product details. Review and confirm the output before saving it.

AI features are included on every plan with plan-specific allowances. Pay As You Go actions use credits.

See AI features and usage

Built for

We built Ardent Seller because off-the-shelf tools were either too generic for batch-based recipes or too enterprise for a one- or two-person operation.

Plus Shopify sellers (opens in new tab), Square sellers (opens in new tab), clothing makers, leather workers, print-on-demand, resin artists, pet treat bakers, small farms, and many more.

See all use cases (opens in new tab)

The platform

Raw materials and finished goods across multiple locations. Record purchases, sales, adjustments, and transfers without drift.

Define how products are made, then run production batches that consume materials and produce finished goods automatically.

Record sales across channels, track marketplace fees, and reconcile the difference between gross revenue and what landed in your account.

Recipe costing, true cost of goods sold, equipment depreciation, and Schedule C summaries — the numbers your accountant actually asks for.

Capabilities

The everyday work of a small maker business, in one place — without the spreadsheet sprawl.

  • Multi-location inventory
  • Recipe & procedure costing
  • Production runs from recipes
  • Purchase, sale, adjustment & transfer records
  • Waste & shrinkage tracking
  • Marketplace fee reconciliation
  • Equipment depreciation
  • Schedule C-ready summaries
  • True cost of goods sold
  • Etsy, Shopify & Square sync
  • Batch & lot traceability
  • Smart restock alerts

Reports

Because purchases, batches, and sales update the same records, the questions makers actually ask have a report behind them.

  • How many of each product the materials on your shelf can build, which ingredient runs out first, and the cheapest purchase that unlocks the next batch.

  • A P&L for every market day and pop-up, with booth fees and travel counted against that day's sales — so you know which events earn their fee.

  • Marketplace, direct, and in-person sales side by side: revenue, fees, cost of goods, and true margin per channel.

  • What your craft actually pays per hour, from the timed steps in the recipes behind what you sold — and the price each product needs to hit your target.

For food businesses

Bakers, cottage food producers, and small-batch food makers get the specifics their business demands.

  • Buy flour by the 50-lb bag, scale recipes in grams, sell loaves by the each — the math happens behind the scenes.

  • Tag ingredients and let allergens roll up through every recipe and finished product automatically.

  • See a nutrition facts panel for every recipe, calculated from your own ingredients and serving size — and updated when the recipe changes.

  • Print-ready disclosure labels for all 50 states plus DC, with your state's required wording, ingredients, allergens, net weight, and lot code filled in.

  • Year-to-date sales against your state's cottage food cap, with a pace projection that warns you before you reach it.

  • Batch and lot numbers link purchases to production to sales, so a recall report names every affected product and customer.

Pricing

Free

Best for hobbyists and kicking the tires — 50 transactions a month, 2 users, 2 locations, 1 connected shop.

Most popular

Monthly plans

Maker ($19), Artisan ($49), Workshop ($89) — monthly billing for small shops growing into busy ones and teams scaling production.

Pay As You Go

No monthly fee for seasonal sellers — 30 free credits a month with unlimited users, locations, storage, and connected shops.

Monthly plans in USD. Every plan includes every feature; usage limits differ.
Plan / monthTransactionsUsersLocationsConnected shops
Free / $0 50 2 2 1
Maker / $19 150 2 2 1
Artisan / $49 500 3 3 2
Workshop / $89 1500 5 5 3

Free-plan transactions and PAYG credits are different units. PAYG includes 30 credits each month, then charges for usage at the applicable credit rates. AI allowances, storage, and audit-history limits also vary by plan.

Every plan includes every feature — no paywalls. Full transaction limits, startup bonuses, and feature comparison live on the Ardent Seller pricing page (opens in new tab) .

When should I move from a spreadsheet to Ardent Seller?

Keep a workbook when you mainly need to plan costs, price products, or review a small operation yourself. Consider Ardent Seller when purchases, production batches, and sales need to update the same stock records, or when you need shared access and inventory across locations.

Compare spreadsheets and inventory software

Does Ardent Seller connect to Etsy, Shopify, or Square?

Yes, all three. Etsy and Shopify orders import as sales, and you can turn on inventory push per listing so stock counts flow back to the shop. Square brings in register and Square Online sales with its processing fees booked as expenses. Etsy fees import as separate ledger lines. Each connection counts as one connected shop: the Free and Maker plans include one, Artisan two, Workshop three, and Pay As You Go has no connected-shop cap.

See how the integrations work

Can I import my existing spreadsheet or switch from another app?

Yes. Ardent Seller supports CSV imports. Paid plans also include concierge migration: send your export and the team imports and reviews your inventory, contacts, and recipes, then reconciles the counts. Migration slots are limited and scheduled after signup. The self-service AI Import Concierge is coming soon; it is separate from the team-assisted migration service.

Review migration and plan details

What counts as a transaction?

A transaction is a recorded event affecting inventory quantities, costs, or financials, such as a purchase, sale, production entry, transfer, adjustment, expense, or initial inventory. Each entry counts once regardless of its number of line items. One production run can create two entries, and marketplace fees can create additional entries, so 50 transactions does not mean 50 orders.

Estimate your transaction usage

What is the difference between Free and Pay As You Go?

Free is $0/month with 50 transactions per month, two users, two locations, and one connected shop. Pay As You Go has no monthly subscription fee and includes 30 free credits per month, with usage charged in credits and no cap on users, locations, storage, or connected shops. Credits and transactions are different units; your credit usage depends on the activity and applicable rates.

Compare all pricing and usage limits

Are integrations and AI features included in the free plan?

Every plan includes every feature, including the Etsy, Shopify, and Square integrations, AI document import, pricing advice, and listing copy. Usage allowances differ by plan. AI can draft records from invoices or receipts and suggest prices or Etsy listing text; you review the output before saving it. PAYG AI actions consume credits.

Read the AI feature guide

Is Ardent Seller a download, and who makes it?

Ardent Seller runs in a web browser. It is a product of Ardent Workshop LLC, the same company that makes the workbooks sold on this site. Your Ardent Seller account and plan are separate from any Workshop spreadsheet purchase.

Meet Ardent Workshop

Get started

Start with a few products and one recipe, then record a production run and a sale. Use the free plan to see how the workflow fits your business.

Visit Ardent Seller (opens in new tab) About the workshop