Tag Archive: inventory management

3 Benefits of Donating Unprofitable Inventory

May 22, 2019  Published by

When sales drop or product returns increase, you may find your warehouse filling up with excess inventory. Excess inventory occupies warehouse space, ties up your working capital (especially if you need to lease additional space just for overstock), and in some cases, continues to lose value. For example, if you start selling a new & improved version of an old product, demand for the previous version may drop so low that even big discounts aren’t good enough incentives for customers. Liquidations and auctions are common solutions for dealing with overstock. However, the time it takes for them to start showing…... View Article

Supply Chain Visibility – A Win-Win for Customers and E-Tailers

May 15, 2019  Published by

A good customer experience (CX) comes from consistently meeting shoppers’ expectations during ALL touchpoints with your ecommerce business. Things like the UX design of your website, the tone and content of social media posts & marketing emails, your returns policy, customer service interactions, and the unboxing experience are just a few examples of customer experience factors that e-tailers tend to prioritize. However, despite improved understanding and measurement of how supply chains impact customers, little progress has been made in recent years towards using this information to make CX better. In a joint study from logistics companies, Convey and eft, designed…... View Article

How to use Automation & Warehouse Management Software for Operational Efficiency

October 31, 2018  Published by

Ecommerce companies with high volumes of small orders need to be extremely efficient so that profits are not eroded by operational costs. If you can get through the initial pains of the implementation process, warehouse automation is a great operational advantage in this regard. But, you may find the ROI of automation to be underwhelming if it’s not completely integrated with your WMS. After all, since your WMS tracks and manages everything going on in the warehouse, it should also be facilitating the overall direction of your automated processes. When your WMS is synergized with strong automation strategies, you can…... View Article

Should you Invest in WMS?

October 10, 2018  Published by

A warehouse management system (WMS) is software that is designed to support and optimize multiple elements of warehouse operations and distribution center management. As a major component of enterprise resource management, most types of WMS are comprehensive solutions that streamline warehouses’ abilities to manage, record, measure, and concatenate: Inventory Order volume Backorders Receiving Inventory reorder levels Shipment schedules Delivery status Shipping history Sales data Marketing reports and more – all in real-time Now typically, WMS implementation is customized to the unique requirements of an ecommerce business or fulfillment center’s supply chains and/or distribution channels (especially when the related workloads are…... View Article

Inventory Slotting, Part 2: Best Practices

August 15, 2018  Published by

In our previous blog post, we pointed out how strategically optimized slotting in fulfillment centers contributes to multiple gains in operational efficiency. To realize these gains for yourself, you’ll start by collecting and analyzing various data points about your inventory such as sales velocity, order frequency, size, weight, etc. This inventory data will inform your slotting strategy moving forward – enabling you to slot all your SKUs in a layout that 1) shortens picking times and reduces the frequency of replenishment trips by providing sufficient space for extra stock (informed by sales and order frequency data), and 2) allows pickers…... View Article

Inventory Slotting, Part 1: The Benefits of Strategic Slotting

August 8, 2018  Published by

In fulfillment centers, “slotting” is the process of assigning the designated storage and picking locations for each SKU in your inventory. For most facilities that decide to reevaluate their approach to slotting, the goal is usually to bolster picking times. However, what many don’t realize is that slotting improvements can also yield operational advantages that impact the entire warehouse, such as: Operating costs – Effective slotting can improve intra-warehouse transit times across the board, lowering the net costs of any SKU moving activities. Overall space efficiency – optimized slotting improves warehouse space utilization, which in turn can often delay an…... View Article

Inventory Dimensioning, Explained

July 25, 2018  Published by

When it comes to order fulfillment, the weight and volume measurements of products are a major factor that affects shipping costs, warehouse capacity planning, and more. With this in mind, more and more fulfillment centers are “dimensioning” their inventory – using specialized technology to determine the exact cubic and weight measurements for each SKU, recording that data, and incorporating it into a warehouse management system (WMS). After dimensioning each SKU in your inventory, you’ll have valuable data for optimizing your facility. By leveraging your dimensioning data strategically, you can greatly improve areas such as:     Shipping cost estimates Because the…... View Article

Check out these Statistics on Warehouse Technology

July 18, 2018  Published by

Emerging technologies are a hot topic in the world of distribution and fulfillment operations. From advancements in mechatronic picking to new types of cloud-based WMS software, it’s easy to come away from an industry conference feeling awestruck at what the future might hold. However, the recent DC Measures Study from the Warehousing Education and Research Council (WERC) indicates that the actual adoption and integration of these technologies is slow, with little signs of popularizing any time soon.    According to WERC’s survey of 549 industry professionals, more than two-thirds of warehouse managers said people (not technologies) are the most important assets…... View Article