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One-off Suppliers

Not every purchase comes from your regular supplier. Sometimes you grab milk from a supermarket because a delivery is late, pick up a tray of pastries that were on a short-dated clearance sticker, or take advantage of a one-time promotional offer from a backup wholesaler. Brikly calls all of these one-off purchases and gives you tools to handle them without polluting your regular costing data.

What is a one-off supplier?​

A one-off supplier is a supplier you buy a specific ingredient from occasionally, not as your regular source. Common examples:

  • Buying milk from Tesco when your dairy wholesaler's delivery is late.
  • Picking up flour from a local shop because you ran out mid-shift.
  • A promotional or introductory price from a backup wholesaler that you don't expect to repeat.
  • Short-dated stock or end-of-line clearance buys at a heavy discount.
  • A one-time bulk deal that doesn't reflect what you would normally pay.

Even if the one-off supplier is cheaper, you usually don't want their price affecting your recipe costs. The quantity might be impractical for regular use, the discount might be a one-time event, or the product quality or provenance might not match your standard.

Marking a supplier as one-off​

There are two places where you can mark a supplier as a one-off supplier:

During new supplier verification​

When Brikly detects a new supplier for an existing ingredient (for example, the first time a Tesco receipt includes an ingredient you normally buy from your wholesaler), the New Supplier Data modal appears. At the bottom of this modal, you will see a checkbox:

One-off supplier - Future invoices from this supplier for this ingredient won't trigger price change reviews. Use this for supermarket runs, backup suppliers, promotional offers, short-dated stock, or any purchase you don't want affecting your regular costing.

Check this box before saving to create the one-off pattern immediately. The supplier data is still saved normally, Brikly just knows not to flag future price changes from that supplier for that ingredient.

During price change review​

When reviewing a price change that involves a different supplier (and the price has moved by more than 5%), the review modal offers a choice between Regular Purchase and One-off Purchase.

If you choose One-off Purchase, you can optionally tell Brikly to learn from this decision:

  • Yes, Skip Future - automatically skip price change alerts from that supplier for this ingredient going forward.
  • No, Review Each Time - keep reviewing manually each time.

For more detail on the price change review flow, see Reviewing Line Items - One-off purchases.

What one-off patterns do​

When a supplier is marked as one-off for a specific ingredient, Brikly:

  1. Records the price in the price history as normal, so you still have a complete record of what you paid.
  2. Skips the price change review, so no amber alert appears on the invoice line item and the change does not block submission.
  3. Does not update recipe costs, so your recipes continue to use the preferred supplier's price.
  4. Tracks the extra cost, so the CostingBrik dashboard and supplier optimisation pages show how much extra you are spending on one-off purchases. That lets you see the true cost of last-minute buying, clearance hunting, or promotional deals that don't repeat.
One-off patterns are per-ingredient

Marking Tesco as a one-off supplier for milk does not affect any other ingredients. If you also buy butter from Tesco, that is a separate relationship and will still trigger price reviews unless you mark it as one-off too.

Viewing one-off suppliers​

On the ingredient detail page, each supplier card shows its status badges. A supplier marked as one-off displays an amber One-off badge next to the supplier name, alongside the existing Preferred and Archived badges.

Removing one-off status​

If your buying pattern changes, for example a backup supplier becomes your regular source, or a promotional price turns into a standing arrangement, you can remove the one-off status directly from the ingredient detail page:

  1. Open the ingredient.
  2. Find the supplier card with the One-off badge.
  3. Click the X button on the badge.
  4. The badge disappears and future invoices from that supplier will trigger normal price change reviews.
tip

You do not need to remove one-off status before setting a supplier as preferred. If you set a one-off supplier as preferred, the one-off pattern remains but has no practical effect, because preferred supplier price changes are always reviewed.

One-off costs on the dashboard​

The CostingBrik dashboard includes a One-off stat card showing:

  • The number of ingredients with one-off purchases in the analysis period.
  • The total extra cost paid compared to what you would have paid at the cheapest supplier's price.

The supplier optimisation pages also flag ingredients with one-off purchases, showing which suppliers are one-off and how much extra volume and cost they account for. This helps you spot patterns. If you are regularly making one-off purchases for the same ingredient, it might be time to add a second regular supplier or adjust your ordering schedule. If the same "one-off" supplier keeps appearing at a similar price, it may no longer be a one-off, and you can promote them to a regular supplier from the ingredient detail page.