What Is Reorder Point vs Reorder Window for Customers?
A reorder point is a stock threshold that triggers a purchase. A reorder window is the span of time when a wholesale distributor's customer is due to buy again, read from that account's order history. The point watches a shelf; the window watches when a recurring account will reorder.
What a reorder point means
Reorder point is a traditional term. It is a number tied to a shelf: when the count in a stockroom drops to a set threshold, somebody places an order. It answers the question how far can this fall before we act, and it belongs to whoever owns that shelf.
That is the part worth being blunt about. A distributor cannot see a customer's reorder point, and never will. It sits inside the customer's building. A reorder point tells you about a count you have no access to, and it says nothing about which of your recurring accounts is about to go quiet.
What a reorder window means
A reorder window is outward facing, and it is built from something a distributor can actually see. It is the stretch of days when a given customer is expected to order again, measured from the gaps between that account's own past orders. Lakeside Facility Supply does not watch a number on a customer's shelf; they read order dates and count days.
When an account enters its window, that is the moment a rep should call. The window is a range, not a single date, because real buying has some slack around the average.
Why the distinction matters for reps
A point keeps a shelf from going empty. A window keeps an account from drifting to a competitor. The first is a counting task. The second is a timing task, and it is the one that protects revenue when a small team cannot watch hundreds of accounts by hand.
The two ideas are not in conflict. A buyer can use a reorder point to manage their own shelf while their distributor watches the reorder window to know when to call. They simply answer different questions for different people.
Reorder prediction reads order history, finds each account's window, and ranks who is due, so reps spend time on the call rather than on tracking dates.
See which accounts are due before the phone rings.
Allodial Predict reads your order history and surfaces the accounts that need a call today.