Sometimes yes, but not always. Essentially, there is a difference between the "cost to produce" and the "value", and this can cause confusion, so it's important to understand the options and why. The batch cost report and margin reports show you the "cost to produce", which may be different from the stock’s "value" which is shown in the "Stock valuation" report.

Breww will track the per-litre cost of the beer for valuation purposes and use this on the stock valuation report. This is slightly different to the costings used for margin reports in Breww. This is further explained here: Batch costings & WIP value

The main issue with valuing your stock at its production cost is best illustrated with an example: If you spent £1,000 producing 1,000L of beer and then packaged it into a single 500ml bottle before the rest of the batch was lost for some reason (let's pretend the valve got stock open the rest was dumped on the floor). If the bottle was valued at the cost to produce, it would be valued at £1,000 - which is clearly not a fair valuation for a single bottle of beer. With the per-litre valuation method, the bottle is instead valued at a much more realistic £0.50, which is why Breww uses this method as the starting point for calculating the initial value.

Breww allows you to customise how you'd like wastage (loss volumes) to affect your valuation of beer stock. This effectively allows you to choose to value your stock at the "cost to produce", a straight per-litre value, or a sensible middle ground where an expected wastage is used.

To choose an option, simply head to Reporting->Production & inventory reports->Stock valuations->Valuation settings.

This option will assume all wastage is unexpected, and any wastage will reduce the valuation of the goods.

This will look at the expected wastage set on the batch's recipe and use it to calculate whether you lost more or less than expected. If you lose more than expected, the valuation will be reduced proportionally, and if you lose less than expected, it will increase proportionally.

This will completely ignore wastage so that any waste won't affect the valuation of the goods. The value of the goods will be the same as the cost it took to make the goods.

As with most things, we find the best way to explain is with an example! Say you had a 1,000 L batch, which cost you £1,000 to make. You expect to package 900 L, which would be a waste rate of 10%. If everything goes to plan, and you package the expected 900 L, it is fair to say that the value of that stock is the same as what you put in, i.e. £1,000.

However, if something goes wrong in the process and you only end up with a single 440 ml can, it is tricky to say that the can is worth £1,000, even though that's what it costs you to make it.

Adjusting the calculation based on an expected wastage helps us settle on an appropriate base value. This is why we recommend the Recipe expected wastage method. However, with Breww, you're free to choose an option that suits you and how you work best.

To help you choose the best option for you, we will show you the stock valuation figures that each option would result in using the example above. To recap, you had a 1,000 L batch, which cost you £1,000 to make. You expected to package 900 L, which would have a wastage rate of 10%. You end up successfully packaging 800 L, so less than expected.

As we're not expecting any loss, we simply carry through the per litre value of the batch. The batch costs £1,000 / 1,000 L = £1 per litre, so the final value of our stock is £800.

This method accounts for some wastage but not a limitless amount. So if there is a large amount of wastage, or we're much more efficient than expected, this will affect the final value of our batch's stock.

In this example, a 100 L loss was expected, but 200 L was actually lost. Breww first calculates the per litre value based on the expected packaged volume of 900 L, to get £1,000 / 900 L = £1.1111 per litre. This is used to give us a final stock value of £1.1111 x 800 L = £888.89. If we had actually hit our expected packaging volume of 900 L, then the stock would be worth £1.1111 x 900 L = £1,000, i.e. the total amount the batch cost us. If we were amazingly efficient and successfully packaged 1,000 L, the stock would be worth £1.1111 x 1,000 L = £1,111.11, as we would have more to sell than expected.

This method ignores wastage entirely. It is the same as valuing your stock at cost, so the 900 L of stock will be worth the £1,000 that the batch cost.

The table below shows the different values generated for different packaging options using the same example of a 1,000 L batch, with £1,000 of costs and an expected wastage of 10%.