The uncertainty brought to the business world by the Coronavirus pandemic is not going to leave us anytime soon even after this health crisis ends. This is according to experts who studied and learned that inventory accuracy would remain one of the many major concerns of many retail brands.
We just don’t know when yet, but soon, we will be seeing open signs on store doors again as they try and feel if everything will go back to normal. But according to surveys, this doesn’t mean that retailers have already regained their confidence after a year of shutdown and countless employees were laid off.
The reality is entrepreneurs now have little to no confidence in their inventory levels for each of their items. On top of that, consumers lost the mood for buying lots of items because they are in economic chaos. As a result, retailers may have billions of items in excess inventory and it is uncertain when will consumer start to buy them off again.
This makes inventory accuracy a challenge. But since this is the most important process for every business, we can’t let the pandemic stop us from achieving it. That’s why different tools such as a Warehouse Management System were developed as a solution to ensure inventory accuracy. Locations and quantities are just some of the information that WMS can provide and help in achieving inventory accuracy.
Without WMS, locating inventory will be like trying to find a needle in a haystack, and not finding it means it will be unavailable. The reason behind your inability to locate the product can branch out in countless ways. But with WMS, you’ll easily know the quantities of products you have at every location. Through barcodes, a WMS system can track inventory location for every item on hand and it can be accessible to anyone who holds authority with the information. This method is not only quicker and more efficient, but it also updates real-time. So you don’t have to waste time and effort looking all over your warehouse for the right product when fulfilling a customer order.
Physically counting your inventory is a thing of the past. In addition to being labor-intensive, it is also prone to mistakes and inaccuracies. Not to mention it usually requires a shutdown.
But with a WMS, you’ll have a consistent, real-time, and automated count cycle that won’t require a warehouse shut down. You are free to set the schedule of your count cycle based on your inventory movement so it can happen at any time or any location, giving you flexibility. This will be useful after COVID-19 because you can make use of the saved time and resources to focus on other important tasks.
We cannot stress enough the importance of post-COVID inventory accuracy for businesses. Accurate inventory is what will allow you to fulfill orders correctly and on time. It also helps you meet the need for efficient inventory management grows as you transition to larger facilities from your small warehouse spaces should you succeed.
To level it up even further, you can explore Cloud Warehouse Management Systems (WMS), which offer multi-location management per product. This allows you to determine which warehouse you need to replenish and what item. This ensures that stock is properly circulated and managed effectively, without requiring any significant manual intervention.
