A small stock-based business running out of inventory space can pose serious problems such as delayed shipping, decreased productivity, longer retrieval times for niche products and health concerns due to regular lifting and moving.
Here are six simple ways to manage your quickly growing stock based business without relocating to a bigger and more expensive space:
Work Practices
Take an introspective look at your existing work practices to assess what space-optimisation you can do.
Ask questions such as:
- What percentage of total storage should you allocate to the inventory?
- Does every employee need a separate printer?
- How much is the equipment usage?
- Do you really need the photocopier?
- Should everyone have a separate dustbin or would a central-recycling container save space and the environment?
- How frequently do you use the meeting room and what other purpose can it serve?
- Can your company’s paper storage be stockpiled off-site?
Answers to the questions above can establish:
- What office fixtures are required?
- The optimised placement of the employees, equipment and furniture.
- Whether you need additional storage space
- Whether you need to relocate a bigger office
Open Plan Office
It is an irrefutable reality that walls and doors take up notable office space and restricts the layout possibilities. Therefore, one rational way to manage your inventory-based business is to use an open plan office.
In such a work environment, there are no specific rooms or wholly enclosed spaces. Rather, workstations are placed together, often separated by panels or short screens all within one exposed floor plan.
Before getting into the open plan office debate it is pertinent to ensure if the terms of your leasing contract enable redecoration and refurbishment. Moreover, does the boss (if that is not you) need a private office or is that a hindrance to vibrant workplace communication and team morale?
Vertical Space
You probably do not realise how much untapped vertical space you have in your humbly-spaced room until you start storing up. This will significantly help you to make use of every cubic foot to liberate floor space for other strategic purposes. Vertical utilisation also includes the space above currently stored items, cross passages and common areas.
Re-organise all of your stock and start using vertical organisation methods.
Inventory Management Software
Managing a stock-based business on an upward growth scale calls for a lot of juggling and monitoring of data and various reports. The owner is constantly keeping track of stock in hand, the requirement, and the time needed to receive new inventory. Here, you can use technology to your benefit by automating manual processes by using an authentic piece of small business cloud inventory software.
This will help you to accomplish periodical stock goals in a fraction of time you are investing at the moment. Also, cloud inventory software is accessible from anywhere via the computer, tablet or a smartphone. It permits real-time information access to everyone authorised. Furthermore, the server is managed by the software provider, which also eliminates the need to have internal IT staff.
External Storage
All the stock optimisation and cloud-based inventory management in the world can only help to the degree of your office’s actual space. There will be a time when you will need a considerable amount of new space as a growing business demands expansion.
It is admissible to rid your office’s worn out fixtures, but not to limit your business opportunities courtesy of limited space. Therefore, instead of opting for expensive warehouses give self storage a try! For example, the Cardiff storage company Storage Giant are one company I found who will enable you to store some of your stock in a securely monitored space.
If you live in the Cardiff area, or can find help near where you’re based, try out the services of such a storage company. Self storage can be extremely effective for small business owners who simply don’t have the space. You can learn more about this option at https://www.storagegiant.co.uk/locations/cardiff-self-storage/.
And there you have it! 6 easy-to-implement ways to manage your quickly growing stock business. Although you will also need to consider how you’re managing inventory, resources and staff, assessing the space you have is of upmost importance. If you’re growing fast, you should be taking on more and more stock. The more stock you have, the more space you’re going to need to store it all!
Therefore, consider some of the aforementioned tips for making the most of your existing space and consider investing in self storage if you’re ready to take your business to the next level.
