Dated products carry two deadlines: Amazon's check-in rules on remaining shelf life, and the date itself eating your sellable window every day stock sits in the wrong order. ProShip3PL labels grocery, supplement and topical inventory in Amazon's month-first format, verifies each lot's runway at receiving, applies date and FNSKU labels in one pass, and rotates reserve stock first-expired-first-out from our Medley, FL racks.
Sellers of shelf-stable products get to think about inventory in units. Sellers of grocery, supplements and topicals must think in lots: each production run carries its own date, its own runway, and its own deadline for being worth anything. Two identical-looking cartons can differ by months of sellable life.
Amazon enforces this at the door. Dated units must show the expiration where receivers can read it, in the format Amazon expects, with real shelf life left; the exact minimums shift by category, which is why we verify lots against current requirements instead of memorized numbers. Stock that fails doesn't come home — it strands or gets destroyed.
The quieter losses happen before any of that. A factory prints its date as a lot code no receiver can parse. A fresh delivery gets stacked in front of an older one, and the older lot expires in the dark. A bundle built from mismatched lots inherits its shortest date. None of these are labeling problems by the time you notice — they're write-offs.
Our dated-goods line closes each gap in order: dates read and recorded by lot at receiving, short-runway stock quarantined and reported the same day, labels printed month-first and applied beside the FNSKU in a single pass, and reserve stored under FEFO so replenishment always drains the oldest viable lot first.
| Dated-goods risk | How the line handles it |
|---|---|
| Unreadable or coded factory dates | Decoded per your key, re-labeled in Amazon's month-first format |
| Short shelf life at check-in | Runway verified per lot at receiving; borderline stock flagged to you |
| Fresh stock leapfrogging old | FEFO rotation — oldest viable lot always ships first |
| Recall or supplier issue | Lot log shows what's on our racks and what shipped, per shipment |
| Date and FNSKU applied separately | Both labels in one pass, checked as a pair, nothing obscured |
| Mixed-lot bundles | Outer label carries the earliest inner date; mismatches flagged before build |
Every inbound lot's expiration read, decoded where the factory used codes, and logged with counts and locations on arrival day.
Month-first format, legible type, placed on the sellable unit's exterior — beside, never over, the maker's own markings.
Both labels applied in the same handling pass and verified as a pair — no unit leaves half-labeled for Amazon to reject.
Each lot's remaining runway checked against current category requirements; anything short gets quarantined and reported, not shipped.
Dated reserve racked by lot and drained oldest-first on every replenishment — shelf life stops dying in storage.
A running record of which lots arrived, where they sit and which FBA shipments carried them — recall questions answered in minutes.
The lot lands, dates are read or decoded, counts logged — short-runway stock quarantined with photos the same day.
Expiration label printed month-first and applied with the FNSKU in one pass, both verified scannable and readable.
Stock going to reserve is stored with lot and expiry on record, positioned for first-expired-first-out picking.
Replenishments pull the oldest viable lot, record it against the shipment, and reach the carrier within 24–48 hours.
Almost always a shelf-life miss at check-in. We screen every lot's runway at our dock first — bars without the required window get diverted to another channel while they're still worth selling.
A receiver reading 03-09-2027 as March when the factory meant September is a compliance incident waiting to happen. We re-label every unit month-first, so the date Amazon reads is the date that's true.
That's rotation failure, not bad luck. Under FEFO on our racks, the older lot would have shipped months earlier — reserve drains in date order or the system flags what's stalling.
With our lot history, you can: units on the racks, units in each FBA shipment, dates on all of it. One email turns a scary recall question into a bounded, documented answer.
Anything with a limited shelf life or a use-by expectation: food and beverages, vitamins and supplements, topicals like creams and serums, pet consumables, and many personal-care items. Amazon also treats some products as dated even when the maker prints no date — where a category demands one, a unit without a readable expiration simply can't check in. If you're unsure whether your SKU falls under the dated-goods rules, send us the listing and we'll tell you before you ship anything.
Amazon wants the expiration expressed month-first — MM-DD-YYYY, or MM-YYYY where no day exists — in type large enough for a receiver to read without hunting, on the outside of the sellable unit where it's visible without opening anything. Cryptic factory codes, Julian dates and day-first international formats all fail this test. We print and apply labels in the accepted format, positioned so neither the FNSKU nor the product's own text is obscured.
Yes — decoding and re-labeling is most of this job. You give us the key to the factory's lot code or the date position on the packaging; we translate each lot into Amazon's month-first format and apply a clean label alongside. The manufacturer's original marking stays visible — covering or altering it is the one thing we won't do, since the printed date is the product's legal reference and ours is the readable translation.
Amazon requires meaningful remaining life at receipt — enough to sell through and give the buyer a usable product — and the working threshold varies by category and total shelf life, so we verify each lot against the current requirement rather than quoting one number that goes stale. Practically: we read the dates at receiving, flag any lot cutting it close, and let you decide whether it goes to FBA now, sells through another channel, or doesn't ship. Short-dated stock that slips into FBA gets disposed of by Amazon at your expense — the check exists to keep that from happening.
FEFO — first expired, first out — means replenishment always pulls the lot closest to expiry, not the carton nearest the aisle. Dated inventory on our racks is stored with lot and date recorded per location, and every FBA replenishment draws from the oldest viable lot first. Without that discipline, fresh stock leapfrogs older stock, and the older lot quietly ages past sellable on a shelf. With it, your reserve drains in date order and waste trends toward zero.
Yes — one pass, two labels, checked as a pair. Applying them together means the date on the unit, the lot in our records and the FNSKU on the listing all agree, and neither label covers the other or the manufacturer's markings. It also halves handling: a unit touched once is a unit that can't be date-labeled but forgotten at the FNSKU station, which is exactly the mixed-state error that strands dated inventory at check-in.
Every receipt of a dated SKU is logged by lot: the lot identifier, its expiration, unit count and rack locations. Shipments to Amazon record which lots went out and when, so if a supplier issue or recall touches one lot, you know instantly how much is on our racks, how much went to FBA and on which shipments. It's basic traceability of the kind grocery and supplement brands are expected to answer for — kept for you as a running record, not reconstructed in a panic.
The pack carries the earliest date inside it. When we build a bundle or multipack containing dated components, each component's date is read, and the outer label shows the soonest expiration — a three-pack is only as fresh as its oldest jar. Where component lots differ widely, we'll flag it, because bundling long-dated stock with short-dated stock throws away shelf life; matching lots within a pack is usually the smarter build.
You find out the day it lands, not at Amazon's door. Receiving reads dates lot by lot; anything below the viable threshold is quarantined and reported with photos and counts. From there it's your call — divert to FBM or another channel where the runway still works, negotiate with the supplier using our documentation, or dispose. What never happens is short-dated stock rolling silently into an FBA shipment to be rejected or destroyed on arrival.
Tell us the product category, monthly units, how many lots you typically receive at once, and how dates arrive from your supplier — printed plainly, coded, or missing. Within one business day you'll have per-unit pricing covering date labeling, FNSKU application and lot tracking, with FEFO storage quoted alongside if you hold reserve here. No setup fee, no monthly minimum.
Tell us the category, the monthly volume and how your supplier marks dates today. Within one business day you'll have per-unit pricing for date labeling with FNSKU application, plus a lot-tracking and FEFO plan if you keep reserve with us.
