Perishable inventory demands attention. Specific inventory-tracking methods help with the job of managing and accounting for perishable inventory. Perishable refers to items that have an expiration date, such food that will go bad if not eaten in a certain amount of time. Perishable inventory can also be inventory that will never be available again, such as hotel rooms, seats on an airplane flight, sports events or restaurant reservations. Single-period inventory control and first-in-first-out, or FIFO, inventory valuation are commonly used to deal with perishable goods.