Is inventory replenishment giving you a hard time? You’re not the only one. Balancing customer demand with optimal stock levels while avoiding excess inventory has been a constant challenge for inventory managers and business owners throughout history. But things have gotten easier, and now you can use a cloud inventory control app with inventory replenishment features to deal with those big variables that are costing your business money.
Vendor/Supplier Lead Time Disruptions
Not even the most reliable vendors or suppliers on the market are able to provide flawless deliveries all the time. Disruptions appear sooner or later. The consequences of stock unavailability as a result of failed or delayed deliveries can range from deferred customer orders and slower shipping times to canceled orders and deep customer dissatisfaction.
While there is no single strategy that can eliminate such disruptions — after all, they are beyond your control — a mobile inventory management app like DataQlick enables a very efficient safety stock management process that guards against vendor/supplier unpredictability.
Stock alerts for minimal inventory levels and accurate sales forecasts, coupled with the ability to view stock in real-time, can make this variable a less costly and frustrating problem.
Unpredictable Customer Demand
Predicting customer demand using an inventory forecasting solution can help you optimize stock levels. However, there are times when customer demand becomes fickle and erratic, making it quite unpredictable.
eCommerce businesses are often more at risk, as a host of problems which are not always easy to notice at first, such as search engine algorithm changes or competitors suddenly going out of business can lead to spikes in demand.
Buying emergency stock at the beginning of a month and then forgetting about it until next month is not the best approach. Emergency stock has to be treated dynamically. With the right cloud inventory control app, it’s possible to identify optimal emergency stock levels based on past product performance, and then combine that data with forecasts to determine how much of a specific product you need at any given time.
Warehouse Incidents
Stock can go missing, get damaged, or be stolen from one day to the next. Chronic warehouse staffing problems aside, this doesn’t happen often, but when it does, it can be devastating. If any of these have occurred already, implementing tighter warehouse policies, changing warehouses, or decentralizing your stock is crucial.
Also important is to be able to view and manage your stock at all times individually for every location/warehouse so that you can always put your finger on the problem. Your inventory replenishment strategy should be optimized for every individual warehouse, in that not setting specific minimal stock levels for each location based on local demand invites problems. With a mobile inventory management app, multi-warehouse inventory becomes more streamlined and effective.
The Bottom Line
Automating your inventory management and using the insight that inventory forecasting brings you is the key to minimizing the risks that come with inventory replenishment variables. For maximum efficiency and portability, use an app that works on mobile, like DataQlick.