How to manage Inventory when you have Multiple Warehouses

Warehouse management is the core of inventory management

A warehouse is a place where goods are received, sent to production, shipped out, and delivered to customers. All these aspects of the inventory management system must be well organized and in perfect synchronization to ensure that your customers receive their orders on time.

Inventory management is not easy when a company has multiple warehouses. The key to efficiently and successfully run multiple warehouses is to get a good understanding of the challenges they present and develop strategies for how to overcome them.

Here are few tips that can help you to manage Inventory in Multiple Warehouses efficiently.

1. Managing the Space Efficiently

The more warehouses a company owns, the more challenging it becomes to maintain order and create an efficient layout to easily the customer order. The goal of the company should be to fill orders accurately in the least amount of time to lower the cost of goods.

2. Paying attention to the Bestsellers

The most important tip on running the inventory management system of a company with multiple warehouses is to keep a close eye on the best-selling products. Products from every channel should be considered as well as combined.

By regularly evaluating the products that are sold at a larger scale and the quantity at which it is sold, the company can prepare itself to restock the products to ensure that you never run out of stocks. This decision helps to understand which warehouse the products should be stored in.

3. Applying in Real-Time

One of the most crucial points to be kept in mind for multi-warehouse inventory management is to ensure that all data from the ordering system of the warehouse are integrated and updated in real-time. While managing multiple warehouses, a company will require a quality system to ensure proper management of data.

The third-party logistics provides multi-warehouse management features, for example, create multi-warehouse, manage the quantity and transfer inventory between warehouses, manage doorstep orders, get order notifications, integrate with carriers  and shipping software, access real-time orders status with all market place, etc.

4. Wave Picking and Cross Docking

Wave Picking and Cross Docking, both help to fulfill the needs of the customer and achieve the desired goal of the company.

The process where a product is shipped as soon as it arrives is called Cross  Docking. This mostly comes into play when a company is manufacturing its own product, and with the help of the cross-docking method, the company develops a made-to-order system that reduces the amount of storage space that requires a lower warehouse cost.

The process of Wave Picking is for larger growing businesses which involves more storage space where orders are filled consecutively throughout each day.

The usage of both these methods depends upon the kind of inventory management system a company has for its shipping services.

5. Stock Counts:

Stock counts are equally important in any multi-warehouse management system. Along with keeping a track of the total number of products, it is important to assess the levels of stock at each of the inventory management systems at your warehouses. It is also very essential to ensure stock levels are equally balanced at the warehouses.

Keeping a track of the sales report is equally helpful to understand where and how goods will be placed inside the warehouse.

Few more essential tips for a multi-warehouse inventory management system are:

Labeling your products is very essential so that they can be found easily. The process of barcode scanning is very helpful in this process.

Another tip for successful inventory management for multi-warehouse management is using secure and movable tracking options.

When customers get the wrong item, it leads to wastage of time and labor. It affects the reputation of the company. The trust of the company is built when the right product is delivered to the customer, and a tracking option for the same strengthens the trust.

Destinations can be managed and assigned easily by tracking the warehouse assets.

We can conclude that analyzing the process can be done to cut personal costs and time pick, pack, and shipping, and restocking the item.

Keeping a track of the sales report is equally helpful to understand where and how goods will be placed inside the warehouse.

Lastly labelling of your products is very essential so that they can be found easily. The process of barcode scanning is very helpful in this process

Another tip for a successful inventory management for a multi-warehouse management process is using secure and movable tracking options.

When customers get the wrong items, it leads to nothing but wastage of time and labor. It also affects the reputation of the company. The trust of the company is built when the right product is delivered to the customers, and a tracking option for the same strengthens the trust.

Destinations can be managed and assigned easily by tracking the warehouse assets.

We can conclude that analyzing the process be done to cut personal costs and time pick, pack and shipping and restocking the item.

Keeping a similar team for products picking to restocking as they will have a similar approach about where can they find stuff, who to pack, why they have to ship and how to restock, will save time and makes the process even more efficient.