We built Stockpile, our online inventory system, to be flexible and easy to use. It's important that you consider how you're storing and tracking inventory prior to setting up your company within our inventory management tool. Areas are one area (no pun intended) that should be of primary concern.
We define "areas" as the place (physical space not location) where you store/shelve/etc your inventory. Not to be confused with the location field, the area field is meant to be the physical area within a specific location. For example, you might have Location A, Location B and Location C where you store/stock/sell your inventory. Within a given location, you will also have areas where your products/inventory are physically stored. A good example of this would be the following scenario.
Let's say that Location A is a storeroom, Location B is a retail shop and Location C is your home office. When you input your current stock into Stockpile, think about the areas within each location as you enter the items into our online inventory system. For Location A, you may have shelves or cabinets in your storeroom. When you're entering items at Location A, use those shelves and cabinets as areas within our inventory management tool. For example, you could input an item for Location A with an area of Shelf 1. Similarily, you could also say the area is Cabinet A, Shelf 1 to further categorize the physical space where your inventory is stored. Try and keep your Areas to a phrase or word that's meaningful. You may even consider a short-hand coding system that you can easily remember. Take for example the area mentioned above: Cabinet A, Shelf 1. Maybe in short-hand this area is called CAS1. This will allow you to quickly input and locate inventory in that specific area. Our system was meant to work as you need it to work so don't get overwhelmed with planning. Signup for a test account today and enjoy free online management that conforms to exactly how you would like to operate your small business.
