When it comes to warehouse management, the ability to track inventory by location is key to maintaining precise and sufficient inventory levels in real-time. ParityFactory’s robust location tracking functionality facilitates this accuracy through the adoption of scannable location barcodes and a variety of configuration options that allow our users to track their inventory at the exact granularity desired. Rarely is this feature the main reason people buy our system. However, more often than not it’s one of the biggest perks to adopting digital lot tracing, and users are regularly surprised by just how many day-to-day tasks that this one function helps streamline.
But what exactly does it mean to track inventory by location? In its simplest form, the location tracking functionality enables businesses of any size and scale to create and customize a multitude of locations at varying levels of specificity, including:
• Warehouses/Facilities
• Buildings within the Warehouse/Facility
• Rooms within a Building
• Aisles within a Room
• Layers and/or Slots within an Aisle
Physically, what this looks like is a user scanning a physical barcode that is associated with a location when they receive, move, stage, or ship out product. This allows ParityFactory to tie that product to that location.
This base configuration enables system users to move inventory quickly and easily throughout warehouse(s) while providing added transparency in reporting, inventory planning, storage, etc. which all only increase the more granular the tracking is implemented. Users are empowered to adopt advanced location tracking features over time, including but not limited to:
• Setting up designated location zones/types that enforce proper storage conditions and/or only allow storage of specified products. This drastically reduces possible employee error and has the added proxy benefit of making training easier by simplifying certain processes.
• Specifying a maximum capacity (ex. number of inventory units) that may be stored in a location(s).
• Prioritizing locations within a location zone to enforce the location order in which inventory is stored, thereby helping floor staff to more easily adhere to rules such as FEFO/FIFO.
• Placing inventory on hold by location
• Conducting cycle counts by location, rather than having to perform a count of the entire facility’s inventory.
Benefits of Inventory Tracking by Location
The operational benefits of tracking inventory by location are many, and they’re immediately realized once a system is up and running. The first, and probably most obvious, is the increased accuracy of inventory. Rather than becoming one nebulous figure in the system, the inventory is known at a more precise level. In addition, because specific inventory can be tracked to where it is in the facility, enforcing standards such as FEFO and FIFO become a breeze, as does easily finding inventory to move for holding or staging purposes. In addition, management staff can use the location put-away data of items to analyze and enforce proper storage conditions for their products, reducing possible loss due to employee error.
These are just a few of the benefits that can be through inventory location tracking. We’ve helped hundreds of food and beverage operations achieve these goals for their business, and we’re ready to help you too! Reach out and Schedule a Demo today to learn more about how ParityFactory can be an asset to your business.