If you are looking for ways to manage your warehouse effectively, then inventory management is the primary key to efficiently managing the stock.
Before you go on and hire the labor to manage the inventory, you need to learn the basics. Warehouse management is a part of inventory management that focuses on understanding the stock-in and stock-out and where each item is located. It is similar to inventory management, but the focus is narrowed down to several specific operations.
It includes the main jobs like data collection of the product, storage capacity, the performance of the operations, and the quantity of the stock. To run an effective warehouse, hire a qualified warehouse manager and put a warehouse inventory management software that allows you to keep track of processes and merchandise.
This article is intended for the business owners who are opening their first warehouse or who wish to improve the efficiency of their existing warehouses.
What is warehouse inventory management?
Warehouse inventory management is receiving, tracking, auditing, and managing merchandise stored in a warehouse or any other storage facility for order fulfillment.
Warehouse management also offers stock replenishment when specified minimum amounts are achieved, allowing you to refresh your inventory to ideal levels based on past sales data. Like other inventory management systems, warehouse management is concerned with controlling incoming and exiting products while also knowing where specific components are placed.
Warehouse management is a part of inventory management that oversees all products a corporation keeps, from establishing purchase orders for suppliers to ensuring the smooth delivery of products to clients.
How does the warehouse inventory management system operate?
The warehouse inventory management system has several vital features that will assist you in monitoring the commodities in your storage facilities and overseeing inventory control. Warehouse management software is sometimes integrated into more extensive enterprise planning software; in other circumstances, warehouse management software is used as a stand-alone system.
If you wish to manage your inventory across your company, it is best to purchase an integrated approach.
Don’ts of Warehouse Inventory Management
Excessive Stock
Those bulk bargains that offer “too good to pass up” discounts should often be avoided. Excess inventory consumes considerable space and money. You should focus on the high-demand products at the time. It will save the excessive cash you plan to spend on labor. That is why you should perform an in-depth market survey before production.
Collaborate with suppliers to organize smaller shipments to better meet demand, freeing up space and money.
Inefficiency in Receiving Department
During a rush, the stress of moving orders from intake to outgoing can be overwhelming for all staff. The receiving department is a common area that is overlooked.
Managers frequently say, “Let’s get these products moving,” and receivers are under pressure to get the commodities into pickers’ hands. Inventory and accuracy errors are the result of shortcuts.
Ensure that all dock-to-dock protocols are followed. Cross-training some personnel to cover the receiving department in emergencies such as call-outs and peak hours is frequent.
Wrong Pick-Paths
Are your picking routes that are crisscrossing the warehouse? Are the most in-demand products centrally located near the dispatching areas? As straightforward and obvious as this sounds, many warehouse managers fail to recognize how inefficient the pick-paths are, resulting in irritation. Examine how much time is wasted getting to the warehouse to pick. Shouldn’t two frequently ordered orders be binned close to each other, if possible?
Improper Cleaning
Warehouse employment necessitates the usage of items that can quickly become a hazard in the workplace. It only takes a busy shift and a lack of attention to generate a congested floor.
Also dealing with pallets, shrink-wrap, labels, and damaged goods. As a result, the following shift is burdened with a higher task, and labor costs are wasted. Efficient warehouse operations devote time to cleaning up at the end of each shift and emphasize the value of working smarter, not harder.
Lack of Training
What is the most valuable asset in any organization? The people who make it all happen.
After a victory, the most successful firm recognizes that teamwork leads you to the winning path. If your warehouse wants high turnover, one formula for success is to ignore the demands of your workforce. Then there’s the time and money spent on hiring and training, not to mention the revenue lost due to order delays.
Do’s of Warehouse Inventory Management
Automated Data Collection
Any warehouse employee who spends time writing numbers down or manually tapping the data wastes time and resources.
With barcode and radio frequency identification taking over warehouse operations, now is the time for your firm to take advantage of technology improvements regardless of size. Expect higher efficiency and effectiveness, decreased labor expenses, and more precise order fulfillment.
Advance Notifications on Shipping
A regular shipment schedule may be efficient for the receiving department, but this is only half true. Weather-related disruptions, out-of-stock situations, and traffic delays are all prevalent in logistics.
Staffing is arranged following the reliance on regular delivery days and times. Then, management is forced to scramble when an unavoidable delay or cancellation occurs. Collaboration with all parties involved is required to deploy advanced shipment alerts to properly arrange staff and inventory levels. As a result, the workflow across the warehouse can be better managed.
Transparency
Are essential personnel able to obtain critical information timely? Is your receiving department capable of inbound shipment manifests far enough ahead of time to adequately prepare?
A company-wide information system that transmits data on time and allows easy access would help each department, and hence essential workers, accomplish their job responsibilities better.
Proper Supply Chain Organization
Accurate inventory tracking at all stages of its life cycle is crucial for efficient operations. Particularly in the industrial sector, where a single flaw in inventory controls might halt the production of a product.
This is related to information transparency because a product on a production line may require a certain number of components of a particular product. Is each department able to access inventory levels, and how do we ensure these levels are accurate?
Scheduled Cycle Counts
Are we solely depending on our annual inventory count? This is risky because discrepancies occur. You will be better equipped to investigate disparities if you implement at least a quarterly cycle count. This will result in fewer out-of-stocks and surprises.
Final Thoughts – Implementation of a Warehouse Inventory Management Software
A warehouse inventory management software can help streamline and improve a variety of warehouse management duties and update a real-time inventory record of all existing stock.
As long as your warehouse personnel scans and catalogs products as they enter and travel through the warehouse, your warehouse inventory management software will reflect all of your existing stock and its particular location in the warehouse.
Furthermore, warehouse inventory management software can be configured to automatically replenish stock when a preset minimum amount of products is reached.
The finest software automatically analyses past sales data to establish the appropriate minimum amounts for automatic reordering and the quantities at which each product should be replenished.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is inventory management?
The process of ordering, storing, using, and selling a company’s inventory is called inventory management. This comprises raw material, components, completed product management, and warehousing and processing such commodities.
What is the importance of warehouse management?
Your warehouse is critical to ensuring that your firm fulfills its production targets. A Warehouse Management System improves the process by allowing you to move goods through your warehouse at maximum speed, enhancing every stage of the fulfillment process.