Inventory forecasting software

Optimizing your inventory is critical to the success of your business

Most businesses have a significant, if not the largest, amount of their capital tied up in inventory.

Too much inventory reduces cash flow and the opportunity to use those dollars for a better moving product. Too little inventory can result in lost sales and poor customer satisfaction. Caught in the middle of the inventory balancing act, many businesses rely on guesses when it comes to predicting what inventory they need and just hope for the best.

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, Pigs Unlimited

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, Pigs Unlimited

“Acctivate reporting really gives us a better idea of what our customers are purchasing more of, what they’re not liking, and what they could use more of.

It also helps us with the sizing because with pigs there are some sizes that are more popular than others so it makes it easier to see those trends.”

Lauren Barrera

Controller

Software to predict sales and inventory demand more accurately

The ability to quickly adapt to fluctuating customer demand, variable requirements or changing market conditions can be the profitability difference maker.

Smart business decisions require insight that can enable actions to improve the situation.  The process is greatly improved if it can be accomplished quickly and easily, with suggested action items.

Fortunately, forecasting tools exist to help you understand your inventory needs, assists in optimizing existing inventory levels and provides guidelines that can improve purchasing management. As a result, customer satisfaction and profitability are increased.

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, Pigs Unlimited

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, Bird Watcher’s Digest

“With Acctivate, we know our inventory and we have control of it. We are able to predict future demand accurately, so that we don’t overstock or understock our inventory.

That’s a huge plus for any inventory-based business – not only does that maintain satisfied customers, but it maximizes our profitability as well.”

Ann Kerenyi

Controller

Using demand planning software for understock analysis

You can’t sell it if you don’t have it.

Many businesses don’t realize the real cost of a lost sale due to an out of stock.

Start with the marketing time & money that was invested to attract the customer –  a customer that was ready to buy – then was disappointed that the item they wanted was not available.

Next, the obvious, the profit on that sale that was lost. But it’s not finished there…the business image has been tarnished & that customer may not return in the future.

Lost profit, a disappointed customer and your reliability in question.

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Acctivate inventory demand and forecasting software user, Rainbow Book Company

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Acctivate inventory demand and forecasting software user, Rainbow Book Company

“I couldn’t run the business without Acctivate. It provides me all the information that I need in order to project one year out, five years out, or 10 years out, as well as what we need to be doing and how I need to deal with our banks and lenders.

Acctivate allows me to review and forecast commissions, sales, internal payroll, etc. and it just gives me such a great view of everything that’s going on that I need in order to run the business.”

Michael Sherman

Co-owner

Inventory forecasting software can help you reduce lost sales from out of stocks

One method employed to reduce lost sales is to attempt to track sales lost as a result of an out of stock. However, there are potential flaws with this approach – sales may not consistently record every out of stock lost sale, they may double-record the lost sale, etc.

A better, more accurate approach is to utilize inventory analysis and decision support tools that enable buying trend analysis to better predict future buying and production needs.

And then there’s the phantom inventory lurking in the shadows. Phantom inventory is simply inventory that shows as inventory on-hand when in reality, none really exists. Phantom inventory can significantly affect lost sale due to out of stocks since it appears quantity is on hand when it is not, and therefore, purchasing does not reorder the item.

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, LDA Creations

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, LDA Creations

“We use both the backlog reports and sales reports in Acctivate to figure out what we need to reorder at any given point. The inventory backlog report has a lot of different information on it and helps us plan purchases.”

Deb Propst

Accounting Manager

Inventory demand planning software with sales analysis

In this competitive environment, it’s never been more important to make sure customers are satisfied, getting the products that they want, when they want them.

To accomplish this, companies must examine their business holistically. Viewing the entire business, from sales to purchasing to operations to the warehouse, provides the ability to analyze & implement quality, consistency and efficiency improvements with far greater results.

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Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, LDA Creations

Acctivate inventory forecasting software user, DSX Access Systems

“Reports are really useful, especially if I’m negotiating a contract with one of our contract manufacturers – I at least know true usage over a year’s history. I can know I’m going to sell about 1500 of these a month and 300 of these a month. To get accurate, good pricing from my suppliers, I have good, accurate numbers to give them and the reports come straight from our Acctivate database so they are 100% accurate. It’s just handy to have that.

Just by running a few reports from Acctivate last year, we found a few product lines lacking in sales for whatever reason. We have a lot of raw inventory on hand that we’re not going to use necessarily quickly so we adjusted our purchasing. We see the effects every month as our total inventory numbers get down to where we want to get it. This frees up cash flow on the front side and just makes us a little more profitable and everybody likes that.”

Marty Monroe

Controller