How to Manage Your Small Business Inventory
If you ask any successful small business owner what the key to their success is, they will certainly mention the importance of staying organized. This is because it is impossible to manage your small business inventory if it is unorganized.
To keep your small business organized, you need to hold, track, and manage the items that you sell. This can be achieved through effective approaches to inventory management and storage. For inventory management and storage to be adequate, it must use a system that involves various organizational features. Features such as smart layouts for quick order fulfillment, an internal tracking system, and more.
Maintaining this kind of inventory storage and management system is crucial. Why? Because it makes it much easier to track and locate items for shipping or restocking.
The benefits of organized Small Business Inventory
This level of organization helps minimize theft, too. You won’t notice when something is missing when you have no idea where it is supposed to be in the first place. It will also reduce order fulfillment and stock problems too. How? When your small business inventory is organized, you will not have to worry about selling something you no longer have. Or even worse, ordering more of something that has not been selling well.
What are the best options for storing small business inventory?
The type of inventory storage system you will require will likely depend on the size of your business. Also, its stage of growth, and how much inventory you have to store.
As your business matures, you may need to update your approach to inventory management and storage. You want to ensure that it aligns with your changing needs. The following are some of the potential approaches to the management and storage of your small business inventory:
1. Storing inventory at home
When you’re just starting and your inventory is not too large, it is feasible to store it at home. This will save you money and make your inventory accessible at any time.
The key to this approach is separating your inventory from your personal space. Make sure it is stored in a cool, dry area away from pets, kids, and other household hazards. You can even invest in mobile shelving to keep your inventory well organized while it’s at home. Or you can purchase a security system and heavy-duty locks to ensure it is kept safe and monitored.
2. Storing inventory in your back office
If your business has a physical office and you have limited inventory, at least while you are starting, it is possible to use a back-office storage room to house your items.
Again, you can invest in good mobile shelving units for this room to keep everything organized and off the floor. You may also want to put a lock on the room’s door and only provide keys to authorized employees. Or use a coded lock to simplify things further.
3. Storing inventory on your shop floor
If you have a physical store that you operate either as your main business or part of it, you can store much of your inventory, if not all of it, on your shop floor. This approach saves you the hassle of finding a place to keep it elsewhere.
If you do not have shelves in your shop floor space, install plenty of them. This will give you the room to create displays that double as inventory storage. Make sure to optimize your displays to appeal to customers. Place the newer items in the center to attract attention. Additionally, take photos once you have a good display set up so recreate it as items sell.
4. Storing inventory in a warehouse
If your small business inventory is too much to keep in any of the places mentioned above, or you believe it will soon grow to that point, you may want to start looking into storage warehousing options. This option will benefit you as you will have a dedicated site for all of your items.
There are several different types and sizes of warehouses. Search for one and keep your business’s specific needs in mind. If you are planning on only storing your items at a warehouse, choose one close to your business. This will make picking them up to pack and ship yourself easier.
However, many warehouses will take on the order fulfillment process for you. This kills two birds with one stone and makes your life much easier. When you store your inventory in a warehouse, you can benefit from their security system and protocols. Additionally, their organization and inventory management system, and potentially, a variety of other services they may offer.
This is a much more comprehensive approach to inventory management and storage and is especially helpful if you intend to scale up your business in the future. Or if you are already in that process.
How Wills Transfer Ltd. can help you store and manage your Small Business Inventory
If you require inventory management and storage solutions that involve storage warehousing for your small business inventory, Wills Transfer Limited can certainly help. We have over 75 years of experience in the warehousing industry and have been helping our customers to store and organize their inventories for that entire time safely, securely, and efficiently.
We have six storage facilities that amount to over one million square feet. At each of these facilities, we offer a wide range of innovative logistics solutions and fulfillment services. We offer everything from pick and pack services and asset tagging to inventory management and order fulfillment.
Our team of professionals has plenty of experience storing goods of every type. So we can be trusted to handle your inventory with the utmost care, no matter what items it includes. Our inventory management system will keep track of your stock levels so that you never run out of items. Plus you always have an idea of the state of your inventory.
We pride ourselves on keeping our services quick and efficient. We are constantly looking for new ways to update and optimize our processes. Making things as streamlined as possible for ourselves and our customers.
For more information about our storage warehousing services, or to learn more about our other services, call Wills Transfer Limited at 613-704-7549 or contact us here
