How can you optimize inventory to stand out and boost your brand?

Simple steps to know your demand: - take the current in hand inventory count correctly. - check sales trend over the few weeks, better to compare previous week, previous month and previous year. - check for any special event, occassion, festival etc which might have affected business in the last. - breakdown your menumix into categories - Finished product and unfinished , and then further perishable, non perishable, packaging. - check for lead time form vendor or from warehouse. Do know when will be the next order and delivery. - keep 15 to 25 % as buffer while setting demands. Higher selling products can have higher %, while low selling can have low %. - while ordering keep in mind about the space available with you. Do not over stock.

Summarise and analyse your sales history - over 2-3 years if possible. Grouping products by category, and then looking for patterns (what are the highest / lowest selling months, qtrs) and provide a commentary historically with your sales business partner - did we run promotions, is it a new product, or is there a naturally higher demand during these periods (e.g. sell more icecream in Summer hot days, vs Winter) Having an insight into opening and closing inventory by month can also determine if a short selling month was due to availability. Your stock cover, can be defined in a number of weeks or months, and using the seasonal profile of demand, you can have higher cover in peak, periods, and lower stock cover in low periods by SKU.

Need to work on past consumption and forecast of next 2 year. Critically need to review the product having more flactuation in demand. Common products need to focus .

Key is identification of the key market for seeing your brand in all its glory, not before maximising marketing, optimising presentation and lean practices. Impressions are so important, not only for external potential, but also internally to build pride and culture

One way to simply categorize your SKUs according to the demand patterns is as follows: - Regular - Seasonal - Intermittent - Erratic You then have to combine the above supply patterns with the distribution of "demand during lead time" for each of your SKUs. For example, the historical demand of an SKU may look very erratic within a period of 2 months but if the average lead time is also in the order of 2 months and not very volatile then the distribution of demand during lead time becomes very regular, predictable, and mathematically tractable. If however, both the demand and lead time are erratic, you have to establish an agile interdepartmental planning process to recognize possible future demand transactions very quickly and react fast

In larger organisations supplier analytics help to evaluate performance on select dimensions : 1. Supplier On time in full delivery 2. Deviation of Leadtime 3 Purchas price variances 4. Quality 5. Innovation / Joint business development initiatives. 6. Management complexity Overall supplier spend, spend category, strategic importance can help procurement teams manage supplier relationship on an business impact perspective| Other consideration include: Vendor Payment Terms External geo-political and macroeconomic factors. An inventory policy may determine how to maintain a desired service level with your customers, against potential volatile or infrequent suppliers.

I think all the points in this article are relevant, in my perspective knowing your customers/guest is at the top of the funnel, identifying the target audience, studying their purchase history, basket size and variance in their purchase behavior will help us plan our inventory, safety stock and also curate deals to specific audience ensuring the inventory is moving out of our network, holding the inventory in store backroom or Distribution centers is burning money every minute.

When choosing suppliers, an attribute that you need to look for besides quality, price and delivery is their research and development involvement. You should be able to assess the alignment of your suppliers' R&D department with your new product introduction efforts. If you start the whole process with a streamlined R&D process, then good quality, competitive prices, and on-time delivery will be more likely to follow during the entire lifetime of the product.

Maximizing great tools such as RFID will provide you with accurate data with a simple swipe. This tool saves time, reduces cost, and lowers your shrink.

Inventory needs to be both managed Physically (where the materials or goods are located) and financially (who has ownership and financial risk over the goods. Consideration should be firstly made at a policy level to establish: Definition of what is classed as inventory (raw materials, finished goods and consumables) vs outside of scope (capital equipment e.g. plant equipment / vehicles / IT infrastructure) Financial ownership - Material stored on premise, across multiple warehouses, goods in transit (domestically, en route to customers, or despatched from suppliers and invoiced - awaiting receipt) Once defined, companies should consider risk, frequency of stock takes and cycle counts, storage, and target turns. Returns policies, Wty.

In addressing this issue for a client I got an agreement to develop work instructions, test the instructions, and provide training for workers and monitoring by supervision. We achieved significant improvements in inventory control and accuracy.

Depends on your bookeeping! Loss and theft prevention are good to practice but when it comes to your books if you cannot write off a loss then you are out of pocket and that is what sinks a business into the red.

Many small to medium sized businesses usually use a combination of excel based spreadsheets, or their in house accounting software to manage their inventory. These approaches are perfectly acceptable until the business looks to want to optimise their inventory mix, and improve stock turns. The complexity of having multi customer, multi supplier and multi site operations, across many SKUs can introduce a variety of scalability issues, and data which hasn't been structurally managed can introduce errors and inventory discrepancies. Specialist software including major ERPs are expensive, but with proper implementation and management, provide advantages in terms of accurate inventory reporting and management.

I agree that the new softwear has been quite a benefit for all businesses. It does save time and effort as well as prevent silly mistakes in tracking information. Fewer mistakes always means a higher return on investment so go! go! computer softwear.

Inventory availability can be a competitive advantage for your business, as opposed to other options. What is your stocking policy that you can go to market with? What is your service level that you can promote your business to new customers with? Can you support key customers by offering inventory consignment agreements? Is your inventory of a superior quality - fresher, with a longer shelf life? Do you offer an extended period for overstocks, change of mind returns or similar? Can you offer variations of your product (different colours, packaging configuration and finishes) by value adding to your inventory for your customers?

Consider this: Your clients don't know what you stock, sure they have a general concept. The impulse buying section works because buyers see product. So how do they find out? Find the items that appeal most to your buyers and promote them on social media, a newly built website or even color flyers in high traffic areas.. that way you have the exposure and interest without creating a full inventory online website.

Wow! You said it all and that my friend is all there is to it. Plus, create repeat business for a higher return and ease of sales.

Many businesses struggle to define a stocking policy for new product introductions. Sometimes, it's a case where a product is bought, and then an assessment is made of it's sales performance, at certain intervals e.g. 3, 6, 12 months. Products that are new, don't have an established history unless they supsede something else, or are intercompatible. If this is the case, the existing stock holding may sell through at a slower rate, as customers convert to the replacement product. New product sales as an indent and variants can cannabilise the sales of the existing range. Assumptions should be clearly documented, if there is a new product launch document. this assists the category and inventory teams with analysis post launch & revisit stock

A key element in truly understanding “demand” is to look on the “dark side”. Does the criminal element crave your products? Do your products have value on the streets or to the bad guys that liquidate the stolen goods in what's called the “gray market” meaning online sales. It will impact your demand, your refill/reorder rates and ultimately consumer confidence. Will you be forced to 1) reduce on shelf availability or 2) add merchandise protection devices. These are costly to buy and impact labor costs to put on/take off at register. Shoplifting and ORC teams also increase overall risk if running a bricks and mortar store. They not only damage the physical store but threaten customers and employees. This will impact your turnover

Optimizing inventory is a crucial aspect of standing out in a competitive market and boosting your brand. Here are some strategies to optimize inventory and leverage it to boost your brand: 1. Understand Customer Demand 2. Focus on Product Variety and Uniqueness 3. Implement Just-in-Time (JIT) Inventory Management 4. Utilize Technology and Data Analytics 5. Offer Customization and Personalization 6. Provide Accurate and Real-Time Inventory Information 7. Collaborate with Suppliers and Distributors 8. Emphasize Sustainability and Ethical Sourcing 9. Optimize Packaging and Presentation 11. Offer Value-Added Services

Inventory management is a consistent and ongoing challenge for many organisations. Too much inventory, there is risk of ullage, spoilage, and working capital is tied up that may be used for other initiatives. Too little cover, leads to out of stocks, service and can inhibit sales growth and lose customers. Too wide of a product offering, means customers and internal management can be confused with superfluous offerings. Customers in a contracting economic environment are looking for cost savings, and may compromise a little if cost savings can be passed on, by sharing information and insights, or reducing service levels. A great way to reduce inventory, is to improve supplier and demand reliability and consistency.