How often have you thought to yourself, I need more hours in the day? If your business is growing, I’m sure you’re thinking about this more and more frequently.
As your business scales, many processes—like inventory planning—become more challenging to manage manually. That’s where inventory replenishment software comes into play.
You could save eight hours a week or more if you didn’t have to spend so much time pouring over spreadsheets and dancing around overstock and stockout and worse… but the idea of selecting the right software to reliably automate your inventory forecasting processes can feel almost as overwhelming.
How can you be sure that the inventory replenishment software you implement won’t cause more issues? Besides, software implementations aren’t cheap: How can you guarantee that your chosen solution will offer you a solid return on your investment?
This post will cover the benefits of using inventory replenishment software and provide five examples of reliable software solutions you may want to consider for your business.
You want to make the best decisions possible for your tech implementations, so let’s establish a few vital things about inventory replenishment software and why your business needs it.
What is inventory replenishment software? Inventory replenishment software, or stock replenishment software, provides visibility to real-time stock levels, sales, supply chain, inventory in transit, and more. A truly incredible inventory replenishment solution will then provide recommendations on when to replenish so you can maintain optimal inventory levels.
Your inventory replenishment software enables you to automate and optimize complex and critical inventory processes, providing you with crucial intel when purchasing or transferring inventory to support sales across multiple channels.
Ultimately, inventory replenishment software aims to reduce capital investment and increase your margins. With the right solution in place, you will be able to stop overordering to prevent stockouts and start ordering exactly what you need when you need it.
With the right inventory replenishment software, you’ll save costs on storage fees, overstock, and deadstock. You’ll also enjoy an increase in sales due to avoiding the dreaded stockout. However, it can be challenging to trust software to make your inventory-related decisions for you. So, we must ask the question: How reliable are automated inventory processes?
Automated inventory processes are more reliable than manual methods of inventory planning. Companies see an average of a 30 percent increase in stock use efficiency when they use an automated inventory process, due to a decrease in human error and the time savings that inventory replenishment software can provide in terms of worker hours.
Blue Ridge offers an inventory replenishment solution that offers fully configurable software that you can use to build the perfect inventory planning solution for your business. Blue Ridge is the best fit for larger, Fortune 1000 companies. It is a more expensive solution, which may put it out of reach for smaller, growing businesses.
Some of the features Blue Ridge offers include:
NetStock promises smarter inventory management. Their software is a predictive inventory planning solution that offers inventory optimization, forecasting, demand planning, replenishment, and more. NetStock is a good fit for teams that don’t have technical staff on hand to help with data analytics. However, NetStock requires the use of an ERP, and there is no direct connection with sales channels.
Some of NetStock’s features include:
Cogsy offers an inventory planning solution that can help you make purchase orders with confidence and avoid missed revenue opportunities. This software solution is great for businesses currently struggling with inefficiencies in their operations that need a quick fix. However, it’s not necessarily the best fit for anyone looking to improve demand planning.
Some of Cogsy’s top features include:
Lokad promises users the ability to make better supply chain decisions using quantitative data. You can use Lokad to improve with purchasing, stocking, pricing, and more. Lokad is best suited for small- to mid-sized businesses in aerospace, automotive aftermarket, and manufacturing.
Some of Lokad’s key features are:
Flieber is a demand planning and inventory optimization solution that uses advanced tech and data analytics to synchronize sales velocity, supply chain operations, and inventory management. It’s our goal to make sure you always have the right products, in the right quantities, in the right place, at the right time. Flieber is the best solution for direct-to-consumer sellers looking to increase their revenue without increasing their workload.
Flieber’s software includes critical features like:
When implemented and used effectively, inventory replenishment software can help you reduce inventory-related headaches like stockout, overstock, and time-consuming manual tracking processes. Using the information provided in this post should help you select the right inventory replenishment software for your business with confidence.
Small- to mid-sized businesses often find themselves stuck between small, start-up-level inventory solutions and massive, clunky enterprise-oriented software. If your business is looking for something robust enough to solve your business’s challenges, but nimble enough to help you pivot and grow, Flieber might be the best solution for your business.
Flieber has helped retailers scale their profits in over a dozen countries using our inventory replenishment software. Flieber’s solution uses advanced technology and data analytics to synchronize your sales, inventory, and supply chain processes to quickly and effectively make decisions that increase your revenue—with a fraction of the work.
To see how Flieber can solve your inventory replenishment challenges, schedule a demo to see our solution in action today!