How Wigan Market Traders Can Use AI to Manage Stock and Identify Best-Selling Products
You're a trader at Wigan Market selling a mix of homewares, small gifts, and seasonal bits. You know roughly which things sell, but you've never properly tracked it. Some weeks you run out of the mugs that go fast. Other weeks you're sitting on ten units of something you bought in bulk last autumn that nobody's touched since. At the end of the month, you're not sure whether you made a profit or not, because you don't have a clear picture of what came in, what went out, and at what margin. AI, combined with a spreadsheet you already know how to use, can give you that picture without an accountant or expensive software.
The Reality of Market Trading
Market trading has constraints that don't apply to shops with stockrooms. Storage is limited: what you don't sell has to go somewhere, and that somewhere is usually a van, a garage, or a back bedroom. Cash flow matters more because you're typically buying stock before you know if it will sell. Different markets on different days have different customers with different buying habits.
Without tracking, you're making stock decisions on instinct. Instinct built on experience is valuable, but combining it with actual data makes it more reliable. You don't need a complex system. You need a record of what you sell, when, and at which market.
Setting Up a Simple Tracking Spreadsheet
A Google Sheets spreadsheet with five columns is enough to start: date, market location, product name, units sold, and selling price. Fill it in at the end of each market day. It takes five to ten minutes.
After a month of data, you have something genuinely useful. After three months, you can see seasonal patterns.
Ask ChatGPT to build you this spreadsheet template. Tell it you're a market trader who attends multiple markets per week and needs to track stock sales by product and location. It will produce a ready-to-use template with the right columns and some basic formulas to calculate daily and weekly totals.
If you're not confident with spreadsheets, ChatGPT can walk you through how to use it step by step. Ask it anything: "How do I freeze the top row so I can scroll without losing the headers?" It will explain it in plain English.
Using ChatGPT to Analyse Your Sales Data
Once you have a few weeks of data, paste it into ChatGPT and ask it to analyse it for you. You don't need to know anything about data analysis. Just copy and paste your spreadsheet data into the chat and ask: "Which products are selling best at which markets? Are there any products that consistently underperform? Which days generate the most revenue?"
ChatGPT will read through the numbers and give you a plain-English summary. It might tell you that your candles sell well at Wigan Market on Fridays but barely move at the Saturday market in a different location. Or that your kitchen accessories sell consistently throughout the year while your seasonal gift items have a six-week window.
That kind of analysis, done by an accountant or business consultant, would cost money. Done by ChatGPT with your own data, it's free and available whenever you want it.
Identifying Slow-Moving Stock
Slow-moving stock is a problem every market trader knows. You bought something, it seemed like a good idea, but it's been in the van for three months and you're starting to resent looking at it.
AI helps you identify these lines earlier, before you've bought more of them. Once you're tracking sales, ChatGPT can flag which products have the lowest turnover relative to the amount you're carrying. It can also suggest options: discount it to clear it, bundle it with something that does sell, or drop it entirely and free up that cash and space.
For slow stock you decide to discount, use ChatGPT to write a short social media post or Facebook Marketplace listing that makes the discount feel like a bargain rather than a clearance. "Clearing space for new spring stock, these are half price this weekend only" is more appealing than "Reduced to clear."
Seasonal Stock Planning
Seasonal planning is where tracking data pays off most clearly. If you know that certain products sold well in the run-up to Christmas, you can buy more of them earlier next year, before prices go up and availability gets tight. If you know that summer 2025 was slow for a particular category, you can reduce your order for summer 2026.
Ask ChatGPT to help you build a seasonal stock plan based on your sales history. Give it your best and worst months, your top-selling products, and your average spend on restocking. It will help you create a simple forward plan that stops you overbought in slow periods and understocked in busy ones.
Writing Product Descriptions for Online Selling
Many Wigan Market traders supplement their market income by selling on Facebook Marketplace or eBay. The difference between a listing that sells quickly and one that sits for weeks often comes down to the product description.
ChatGPT writes product descriptions quickly. Describe the item to it (what it is, size, condition, any notable features) and ask it to write a short, appealing listing. For Facebook Marketplace: "Write a short, friendly Facebook Marketplace listing for a set of four ceramic mugs, unused, in a gift box. I paid £12 for them and want £8. Keep it brief and conversational." You'll get a ready-to-post listing in seconds.
For eBay, where descriptions tend to be slightly more detailed, ChatGPT can write a longer version that covers all the relevant details a buyer would want to know.