Inventory Planning Blog

It is a new year and still old issues abound as well as new ones. In these challenging times, balancing near term inventory resilience with longer-term objectives is an on-going process. You read a lot about reducing costs, buying less, increasing productivity, improving cash flow and more. It is important to keep inventory objectives balanced and in perspective. Yes, times are starting to be more stable in certain areas, but you need to improve your competitive advantage.

Customers will always demand more of suppliers to provide affordable products at the exact moment they want them. How can you effectively insure you have what your customers need when they need it? Supply Chain Management (SCM) is front and center of every business across the globe.

Advanced Inventory Solutions Complement ERP Systems 

Spare parts inventory management is a prime candidate for advanced inventory planning and optimization solutions. With many diverse parts to manage and a lack of power tools, most companies with parts inventories have too many of the wrong parts. The result is unnecessary inventory expense, while still suffering service-limiting stock-outs.

The challenge facing people and companies is they must work steadily at improving their inventory management. In order to improve, you need to know where you are today. First, is to determine what they have accomplished and how competent they are in their planning. Their level of experience and results must be measured to accurately and efficiently move forward.

Part 1 of our Inventory Forecasting blog, covers an overview to inventory forecasting and the techniques available. This continues to review the approaches to inventory forecasting.

Forecasting customer demand is an important and necessary part of the chain of calculations needed to optimize inventory stocking levels. There are a wide variety of techniques that can be used, making forecasting a confusing and sometimes difficult process. If your goal is to not only forecast demand but also stock inventory at optimal levels, then forecasting must be combined with inventory planning and replenishment optimization algorithms to reach the goals of higher service levels with less inventory.

There are some distinctions of business purchases, strategic and non-strategic. Strategic purchases are those that have a direct effect on the business and the bottom line. Non-strategic are those for everyday items like office supplies, travel, commodity items, etc. In the case of manufacturing companies, strategic purchases can be raw materials, production equipment, energy, skilled labor, computers, and business operating software.

ERP on-board inventory management software offers some inventory management, manufacturing, and purchasing capabilities. However, they are not deep in functionality and do not provide true inventory optimization algorithms. Some do have available multiple location capabilities but again depth and breadth of functionality is limited. Lots of manual work is required to make these systems work as needed.

Your mission to be the best supplier of your products in the market today and tomorrow is more challenging than ever. Most companies define what that means in terms of serving the customer. For example, your customers can send you an order and get a return confirmation promptly. You will ship all orders within 24 hours. You will offer a variety of products that is both broad and deep. All great goals to build and grow a business. Now, you go out and spend a ton of money on the inventory.

                                               Feb 2022 Blog

When it comes to inventory forecasting and planning,COVID-19 is presenting a serious challenge. Cases range from plummeting sales to unprecedented peak sales and to longer lead times, to unavailable stock.

Further, the general consensus at the moment, is that the immediate impact as described above will be followed by either an upturn or return to more normalized levels and a gradual return to available stock. Then, there is the unknown question of if the virus will return in the fall/winter and what kind of impact will be felt then. If it becomes an endemic virus, meaning its here to stay like the flu, what then?

Key Words you should know:
Supply chain – logistics – digital transformation – optimization – evolution – innovation

Changes are occurring at lightning speed for all of us today. Consumers and companies alike have to contend with minute-by-minute information and change. The Cloud – Advanced Inventory Planning – Omnichannel – Social Media and much more impact today’s businesses. The options dazzle the mind, do we stay the course or change a little or change a lot.

Signs of a slowly improving global economy are starting to become apparent but far from robust. Consumers have a pent-up need to spend the cash they have amassed. But, production in the Far East is trying to catch up to this demand. Then, there is the massive shipping backlog and serious shortage of truck drivers. Experts suggest these adverse conditions could last well into late next year and possible the following year as well.

Unique and unforeseen events are forcing every business manager to better analyze and utilize their resources. This includes capital, staff, facilities, vendors and more. Especially difficult as we emerge from the COVID lockdown is personnel. If you can’t add staff or find qualified people to fill open positions, you need to increase your existing productivity to compensate. And you need to do it fast. Want to do more inventory planning with the resources you have? Or maybe you need to move a person to another critical department but that would mean not being able to plan your entire inventory.