Effortless Inventory Counting: A Step-by-Step Guide for Retailers
Conducting inventory counts is crucial for any retailer. Accurate inventory data informs stock levels, identifies issues, and enhances overall store management. To ensure inventory counting is effective, it must be meticulously planned, organized and controlled. This guide provides some practical tips to transform this routine task into a powerful business support tool.
1.Organizing your Inventory Counting Cycle
First, establish the frequency for both comprehensive and targeted inventory checks across various product categories by creating an inventory schedule. Ensure the schedule remains adaptable, as each store has unique needs and different product types may require varying check intervals. This planning can be done manually or with specialized software solution like Store Operations & Mobility by leading enterprise software vendor SymphonyAI. For instance, you might schedule inventory checks for the “hygiene” category every two weeks. The system will then automatically generate tasks for store staff, relieving the store manager from the need to manually organize and supervise this process.
Next, select an optimal time for your inventory checks. It’s best to choose a period when customer traffic is at its lowest. To minimize disruption and ensure the process is smooth and unobtrusive for customers, inventories are often conducted during nighttime hours.
Finally, after establishing the schedule, inform and prepare all staff members for the inventory count cycle.
Planning inventory counts in advance enables efficient use of work hours and balanced workload distribution among employees, including potentially bringing in staff from other locations if needed.
2.Training your employees in stores
At this point, it’s crucial to make sure that personnel participating in the inventory counting process know how to properly operate the in-store business application and follow the process. Moreover, store management should foster a sense of teamwork and keep employees motivated. Tasks should be clearly defined, as well as activities discussed, successful outcome criteria identified. For instance, offering meals or coffee to employees if the inventory process is expected to be lengthy.
3. Preparing the store for Inventory Counting
On this step, certain steps must be taken to streamline the process for employees who are directly involved in scanning products, determining quantities, and entering data into the system. To facilitate this:
- Arrange all products so that the barcode and price tag are clearly visible.
- Ensure all items in the store are in their designated areas.
- Products intended for return or write-off should be placed in specially designated areas.
Ordering the assortment and correctly placing products on the shelf is facilitated by planograms — an effective tool, the application of which we have repeatedly discussed in our previous articles.
For inventory counting purposes, it is also helpful to divide the store into specific zones and locations, such as the sales floor and the storage area. If inventory counting is conducted using a specialized application, employees can specify the zone and location where they are counting directly in the system via a terminal or mobile device. This helps track whether products in that zone/location have been counted. If not, the system will automatically direct the employee to that zone/location for counting.
Additionally, the system can generate forms corresponding to specific zones and locations. These forms can be printed and placed on shelves or other locations for visibility, helping employees identify which products need to be counted. The system also includes a printed recalibration form, which provides information on the distribution of employees to locations where recalibration is performed, ensuring clear organization of the inventory process and preventing confusion.
4.Data Preparation
Prior to performing an inventory count, verify that all documents in your central ERP system are accurately updated. In practice, it is common for products to be physically removed, yet this is not always reflected in the ERP system. Hence, it is crucial to ensure that the corresponding data is entered, and all documents are updated to their correct statuses. Before initiating the inventory count, halt any activities involving the products to be inventoried in the accounting system. This includes not accepting, writing off, or relocating products within the category being counted.
5. Conducting the Inventory Count
Utilizing data collection terminals is recommended for physical inventory counts. Modern software solutions, such as SymphonyAI’s Store Mobility, enable inventory management using standard mobile devices, like personal or corporate smartphones, which simplifies the process and reduces costs. Furthermore, these business applications allow employees to initiate counts for specific items and update the system’s stock levels if they detect discrepancies on the shelf.
At least one person is required to count items per category. To improve accuracy and verify the counting, involving two employees is beneficial. If there is enough personnel and time, cross-referencing may be applicable. With the cross-referencing method, two employees alternately count items in the same location, compare their reports, and conduct additional checks on items with discrepancies. This cross-referencing technique enhances the precision of the inventory count.
6. Verification Outcomes
Should substantial differences be identified between your accounting records and the actual inventory during the previous step, specialized systems like Store Operations & Mobility by SymphonyAI can indicate which specific items require verification and automatically assign tasks for employees to recheck these items. The system will prevent the completion of the inventory counting until all “questionable” items have been thoroughly verified and resolved.
7. Finalizing Inventory Counting
Once discrepancies are verified and corrected, specialized Store Mobility solution enable inventory closure with just a click. System automatically adjusts for surpluses and manages any shortages. Such an automation reduces errors, eliminates the need for additional paperwork and manual data entry, and significantly saves time.
8. Analysis of Inventory Counting results
Evaluate the inventory count outcomes to pinpoint any issues and enhance procedures using business intelligence tools or integrated business application reporting, such as those found in SymphonyAI’s Store Operations & Mobility module. It is very important to understand all the mistakes made during the inventory verification process and take them into account when planning the subsequent inventory verification process in the future.
Conclusions
A meticulous arrangement of the inventory auditing procedure, combined with a user-friendly in-store business application, enables efficient management of stock levels, minimizing write-offs and returns, while also preventing spoilage and unnecessary expenses for inefficient stock. Routine inventory assessments furnish a retailer with a foundation for analysis and detection of potential vulnerabilities, facilitating the anticipation of potential errors down the line.