ITEM TRACKING SYSTEMS AND REAL-TIME INVENTORY MANAGEMENT

Methods and apparatus, including computer program products, to support real-time inventory management. Changes to the inventory including the addition or removal of an item from the inventory are reported to the item tracking system in real-time. An inventory planner normally operates on a periodic schedule to perform inventory management functions. The inventory planner can receive alerts from an early warning agent that can cause the inventory planner to perform at least some inventory management functions, outside of its normal periodic schedule. In particular, the agent can send an alert to the inventory planner to cause the inventory planner to determine whether replenishment of store inventory is needed. To make this determination, the inventory planner can retrieve real-time inventory data from the item tracking system.