Be emailed before stock expires — not after you've found it on the shelf

The worst way to learn that stock has expired is to find it on the shelf — or worse, to have a customer find it. By then the only options are a write-off and an apology. The fix is to be told before the date arrives, while there’s still time to discount, reorder, or pull the item. That’s what scheduled expiry email notifications do in WooCommerce with the Sellinor Product Expiration Dates Pro add-on: a digest lands in your inbox listing every product approaching its expiration date, so the catalog tells you what needs attention instead of you having to go looking.

This is a Pro use case. The free plugin already gives every product an expiration date and can automatically hide it or set it out of stock when that date passes. Email notifications sit earlier in the timeline — they’re about acting in time, not just reacting once something has already lapsed.

A digest, not a firehose

The core idea is a scheduled digest. Rather than a separate alert for every product — which quickly becomes noise you tune out — the plugin gathers everything approaching expiry into one email per run. You configure it under Products → Expirations → Settings → Notifications:

1. Enable email notifications.
2. Set the threshold — how many days before expiry a product should be included.
3. Add your recipient address(es) — multiple addresses separated by commas.
4. Choose an email schedule — daily, weekly, or monthly.
5. Save.

On each run, the plugin checks for products expiring within your threshold and sends a single email listing all of them. One message, scannable in a few seconds, with everything that needs a decision in one place.

It only emails you when there’s something to do

The detail that makes this practical: a digest is only sent when at least one product falls within your threshold. You won’t get a daily “nothing expiring” email training you to ignore the sender. If nothing is approaching its date, nothing arrives. When something does enter the window, the email shows up.

While a product stays inside the threshold it will keep appearing in each digest. That’s intentional — it’s a standing reminder that the item is still unresolved. To clear it from future emails you do one of three things: set an expiry action so it’s handled automatically, extend its date, or sell through the stock. The digest stops mentioning it once it’s genuinely dealt with.

Pick a threshold and rhythm that match your shelf life

There’s no single correct setting — the right threshold depends on how fast your stock turns:

• Short shelf life (fresh food, anything with days of runway): a 7-day threshold on a daily schedule gives you a tight, frequent heads-up.
• Longer shelf life (supplements, cosmetics, packaged goods): 30 or 60 days on a weekly or monthly digest is usually enough lead time without crowding your inbox.

If you find you’re getting too many notifications, shorten the threshold so you’re only told closer to expiry, or move from daily to weekly. If something slips through, make sure the product actually has an expiration date set — products without dates never trigger notifications.

What each email tells you

Every digest is built to be acted on directly, not just read. For each product within the threshold it includes:

• The product name with a direct link to edit it in your WordPress admin.
• The expiration date — or the batch date, if you use batch tracking.
• The current stock level, so you can see how much is actually at risk.
• The days remaining until expiry.

The email uses WooCommerce’s email template system, so it matches the look and feel of your other store emails rather than arriving as a plain wall of text. Full details are in the email notifications docs.

Test before you rely on it

Email deliverability is the one thing worth confirming up front, because many hosts need an SMTP plugin to send reliably. Enter your recipients, save, then click Send test email — a sample digest goes out immediately to those recipients (or the site admin if none are set). Check the inbox. If it doesn’t arrive, review your WordPress email configuration and spam folder before depending on the schedule.

Pair alerts with action

A notification on its own only tells you what’s coming; the value is in what you do next. The digest pairs naturally with the Pro add-on’s automatic discounts: the email tells you which products have entered a discount tier, and the tiered markdowns work to clear that stock before the date. The two together turn “this expires in 7 days” from a warning into a sell-through plan — see automatic discounts on expiring products for how the markdown side works.

If you track inventory by lot, the same dates feed batch tracking and FEFO deduction, so the soonest-to-expire units sell first while the digest keeps you aware of what’s aging. And if you’re starting from manufacturer dates, the free best-before date workflow is where you set the dates these alerts are built on.

Where it fits

Expiry email notifications are the early-warning layer of an expiration workflow: dates and expiry actions handle the catalog automatically, reports and the dashboard widget give you an on-demand view, and the scheduled digest pushes the same information to your inbox so nothing depends on you remembering to log in and check. It’s a Pro feature, included in both the Pro and Agency plans with a 14-day free trial — set it once and let the store tell you when stock needs attention.