SMALL BUSINESS INVENTORY MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION
Inventory management techniques and best practices for small business
- Fine-tune your forecasting - Accurate forecasting is vital
- Use the FIFO approach (first in, first out) - Goods should be sold in the same chronological order as they were purchased or created (non-perishable)
- Identify low-turn stock - Stock that hasn’t sold in the last six to 12 months
- Audit your stock - Even with good inventory management software, you still need to actually count your inventory
- Use software - Look for software with real-time sales analytics
- Track your stock levels at all times - Have a solid system in place for tracking your stock levels
- Reduce equipment repair times - Essential machinery isn’t always in working order, so it’s important to manage those assets
- Quality control - No matter your specialty, it’s important to ensure that all your products look great and are working well
- Hire a stock controller - Stock control is used to show the amount of inventory you have at any given time and applies to all items from raw materials to finished goods
- Consider drop shipping - If your business adopts drop ship methods, you can sell products without housing inventory