The Benefits to Outsourcing Inventory Management

A successful and thriving retail, ecommerce or manufacturing business needs to have an efficient inventory management process in place. This can of course be carried out in-house, however, if you are finding that sales are taking up more of your time or you want to free up time to focus on growing your business, then perhaps it is time to outsource stock management. 

If you are already succeeding in the retail or manufacturing sectors then you will no doubt already know about the importance of inventory management and how it is integral to meeting the demands of your customers. The continued success of your business depends on getting this right and involves a lot of forecasting based on past sales. These sales forecasts should be linked to your stock management to ensure you are prepared for peak sales periods and trending, seasonal products. 

The storing and movement of stock can be incredibly time consuming and costly as it is intrinsically linked to picking, packing and dispatch and these departments should all be working together to keep on top of stock and ensure levels are maintained and optimised. It is for the aforementioned reasons that keeping inventory management in – house can restrict you from growing your business further and extending into new markets. 

Outsourcing can help businesses to run their stock inventory more cost efficiently. By delegating the process it naturally allows them to gain more time into diversifying and growing their business. 

The Benefits of Outsourcing Inventory Management

The stock you hold yearly as a retailer is core to how your business will perform over that year. If you have too much stock then you will not be releasing as much inventory and potential revenue as you could, and if you don’t have enough stock then you could be missing out on more sales. It is a delicate balance, here are the main advantages of outsourcing and using a considered stock management system:

• Using a stock management system will feed up to date information on items which you are likely to sell over a certain time period. 
• It will allow you to order an accurate amount of stock at the optimal time. 
• The stock management process will also involve keeping the warehouse organised with seasonal products rotated and high selling items prioritised on space. 
• There will be highly experienced and knowledgeable staff to ensure you are reassured and kept informed, also keeping your own staff costs low. 
• You will no longer need as much storage as warehouse space is part of the outsourcing process.
• Order fulfilment will be optimised as a result of a more efficient and organised stock management system, meaning your delivery times may well be faster.
• The time efficiency will allow for lower or more efficient costs to be invested elsewhere within the business.

Here at Xpediator our warehousing division operates over 115,000 sqm of warehousing throughout the UK and Romania. We offer services to customers in a number of different sectors, including: technology, manufacturing, FMCG, automotive, agriculture, retail, fashion and eCommerce. Our logistics and warehousing services are seamlessly integrated with our domestic and international transport networks, meaning we are able to meet our customers’ cross-border transport needs, just-in-time and final mile deliveries and reverse logistics requirements. 

If you would like to know more about outsourcing inventory management with Xpediator or any of our warehousing services then you can find out more here: https://xpediator.com/services/warehousing-logistics/ or contact us on [email protected]