The essence of a company’s supply chain is inventory. It is important to keep track of what moves from place to place. At each place, it is important to be able to know the balance of supply and demand or suffer the consequences.
Consequences
If your company has too little inventory you risk losing sales and customers from “out of stock”. If you have too much inventory you will need more of everything – more space, more transportation, more labor, more handling and more money.
Manage the flow
To be able to figure out the correct number to keep in stock, you still need to implement the proper flow. But it is not just about the timely movement of the products from your suppliers in Asia to your stores all around the United States. It is also about managing the vast measure of information linked to these goods to keep it moving to the next location. This is known as intuitive inventory management.
What experts say
Experts studying this exercise from both execution and planning outlooks and investigating the latest in leading-edge technologies that can be used to put these guidelines into action. A panel of experts advises getting back to the basics, reviewing serious strategies that some companies have been disregarding over the past several years.
Inventory optimization tools
Inventory optimization tools have been growing in popularity as companies more and more seek to estimate their entire network and determine the best inventory policies for every product.
Use real-time analytics under one platform
Powerful solutions of operations and sales are now using real- analytics that takes a combined data model of a supply chain, demand, as well as financial data, analyze them at any level and instantly be able to provide responses.
Don’t treat all SKUs the same
There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all solution.
Keep an eye on your suppliers
Many suppliers do not deliver as committed or stay on their schedule.
Track essential attributes
Over the past several years, tracking product lineage and traceability should be at the top of any inventory managers’ must-have lists.
Leveraging mobile devices
Mobile technologies and user interfaces are not widespread for catching data on inventory. It is now the time for every business to look for ways to form flexible solutions for accuracy.
