TSB
General => General Discussion and ??? => Topic started by: whitewater on October 14, 2014, 10:11:00 AM
-
I can not figure out a way that i can keep it straight. Most times i order extras, in case of a mess up or 2. Mostly when i was training or if its time sensitive order and there would be no time to print another shirt (who wants to do that anyway)
I have them in boxes right now according to size. But i still have no idea whats in there.
Should i get clear plastic bins? tape a paper on the outside of whats in there?
How do you guys and gals do it?
-
If you are talking about having inventory for actual use I would suggest getting several storage bins. We keep them for white, black and navy (seem to be our most popular). I keep each size and color in a separate bin. We have piece of masking tape with the color, size and count on the outside of the bin. If anyone removes or add a shirt the number is updated.
If you are talking about 1 or 2 pieces that are extras left over that is different. I like to use them for other orders. Is someone orders navy g2000's and I have 1 navy next level I will print that and give it them. They love something free and may be more likely to upgrade the next order.
Matt
-
We tried the bins, we tried a tally system of take one out, check it off. Excel sheets, all sorts of stuff...and right now, they are all in large boxes by size, all effed up in no order, because the color you need NOW is at the bottom of the box and who has time to neatly remove the top contents and grab that shirt? Instead you reach in to the bottom and rip that fkr out - screwing up the arrangement...when you find a system that works, fill me in.
-
This is something we tackle with daily.
Right now I keep Gildan 5000s and Next Level 3600s in black, usually about a case on hand at all times. We have a wire rack, with two sizes per shelf.
Whenever I order goods from AA, alternative apparel, bella/canvas, and next level, I always order extras. Wether it's holes or mis prints, i feel safer having extras. Right now when we are done with the jobs, and we don't use the extras, I organize them in boxes, according to the distributor, so that at the end of the month I can return them.
-
yea..its the 1 to 2 pcs.
yea homer..thats whats happening and its just a mess.
-
This is what we do
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
-
We have rows and rows of racks with rolling ladders and hundreds of SKUs to inventory and access. Only two people are allowed to touch the merch and adjust inventory. Some shops cage and lock this off.
Even still you will most likely be off on the #s. For the clothing lines we keep minimal overstock for replacements.
-
This is what we do
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Oh I just hate you neat azz guys LOL we use bin's and trust me we've tried over and over to keep things organized but over time it becomes a mess again, from pulling and looking for extra shirt's and it's only two of us ::)
darryl
-
If I tried what tance has my stock would be covered in dust and dead bugs in a few weeks. Central Texas and a crappy space I guess...
I use clear plastic bins with a large number on the front. I then have a google spreadsheet with a tab for each brand/style and have color on the left and size on top, then fill in my quantities and have a total on the right. I tend to steer people toward the same 8-10 brands/styles, but I have plenty of outliers.
In the actual bins I try to keep it organized by brand/style/color/size, stacked per size then folded in half, with a piece of parchment paper between styles or colors or brands etc. Some shirts, like black G5000s take up multiple bins as I use those constantly and keep them stocked.
The numbers are impossible to keep 100% accurate as I occasionally pull mid run for a specific size if there is a mistake and forget to update later, but they give you a good idea. I typically order 1-2 extra per size/color/etc for each run, so I have a lot of overage and stock in my shop. I would say 2-3 times a month right now I can run small orders same day without spending anything due to having the shirts on hand. It's nice :D
-
We don't have inventory of anything. There are a few times here and there that we need 1 or 2 shirts due to misprints or damaged goods but the odds of us having the size, style and color needed are so low, it doesn't make it worth it for us. For the shop that doesn't have sales people that open up the Sanmar catalog and say "here, pick one out of these 2,000 t's", it could work wonders. Personally, I'd love to have a few brands and styles that we used for most everything instead of the way we do it. We might do 100-200 jobs before we repeated a style and color during stretches of the year, which you might think is impossible, but it's not for us. I envy those of you who repeat styles and colors often. I've argued for years with the sales staff to narrow down the selection to proven/known styles but my approach hasn't worked, guess I need to pull out the hammer.
-
I have a few boxes of leftover extras that have saved my ass more than once, but still struggle like most of you knowing exactly what I have and then grabbing it.
For me, it's a three minute climb and browse.
The added plus is seeing what else is in the box, and maybe, just maybe that sticking in my mind for future reference.
I really expected one of you smart ass young technophiles to tell us about your inventory label printing program and companion smart phone app so even when on the beach at Cancun, you can check and see if you have two XL Jade G2000's!
-
I can check my stock on my phone because it is in a google spreadsheet, but I don't think I would even care to print out a label from it since it changes so frequently.
-
I stopped ordering extras.
I keep a dozen black G2000's in size S-3XL on hand. When they run out I replace them.
Any extras we accumulate (I ordered incorrectly, customer changed the order after and we never returned, etc) get piled on a shelf like Tance posted. Mainly so we can have a reminder that if we order more ice grey tees there is a dozen sitting on the shelf. When I print up shop tees for giving out I will usually print whatever is on there, with the exception of random large quantities.
In the past when I would order a few extras with every order, I would offer them to a customer of mine at a discounted rate with his order. He loved it. This was a "there's 100 tees here, you get them all. No cherry picking".
The other option, which I never did was an excel sheet. After every order add to it what you are putting on the shelf. Check it before placing an order to see what you already have. But this falls under the category of don't spend too much time chasing a couple of tees to save $5 off your next order.
-
Well what does help us is we pretty much steer everyone to gildan 2000/5000 and don't pull out any books unless they start asking. We don't stock anything else really
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
-
We don't have inventory of anything. There are a few times here and there that we need 1 or 2 shirts due to misprints or damaged goods but the odds of us having the size, style and color needed are so low, it doesn't make it worth it for us. For the shop that doesn't have sales people that open up the Sanmar catalog and say "here, pick one out of these 2,000 t's", it could work wonders. Personally, I'd love to have a few brands and styles that we used for most everything instead of the way we do it. We might do 100-200 jobs before we repeated a style and color during stretches of the year, which you might think is impossible, but it's not for us. I envy those of you who repeat styles and colors often. I've argued for years with the sales staff to narrow down the selection to proven/known styles but my approach hasn't worked, guess I need to pull out the hammer.
This sounds like a nightmare...I'm sorry Alan!
For school jobs and budget folks I basically exclusively use Gildan 5000's or 8000's if they want a blend. They are dirt cheap, print well enough, always in stock, etc.
For the fashion and young folks or people want something a little nicer I steer them toward Next Level or the Anvil 980 basically every time. I have yet to have anyone be unhappy with those choices.
The rest either know what they want already (usually American Apparel, Dickies, or some other known retail brand), want to look at samples for a particular style (women's tank, v-neck, long sleeve with a pocket, etc), or they want an odd style/color combo and I have to basically shop around until I find it or tell them it isn't possible.
I would say 90% of my overage stock is maybe 5 total brands and styles (G5000, G8000, A980, NL3600, AA2001).
I can't imagine letting someone pick a shirt out of a catalog without steering them toward something you are familiar with. There are two many shitty shirts or hard to source shirts with stocking issues to blindly let the customer pick in my opinion.
-
I can check my stock on my phone because it is in a google spreadsheet, but I don't think I would even care to print out a label from it since it changes so frequently.
Just for the odds and ends.
I was thinking that an individual label with bar or QR code would track inventory in and out. As it is, most of us don't rust the 8 pieces listed as residing on a supplier's shelf on the websites.
-
I stopped ordering extras.
I keep a dozen black G2000's in size S-3XL on hand. When they run out I replace them.
Any extras we accumulate (I ordered incorrectly, customer changed the order after and we never returned, etc) get piled on a shelf like Tance posted. Mainly so we can have a reminder that if we order more ice grey tees there is a dozen sitting on the shelf. When I print up shop tees for giving out I will usually print whatever is on there, with the exception of random large quantities.
In the past when I would order a few extras with every order, I would offer them to a customer of mine at a discounted rate with his order. He loved it. This was a "there's 100 tees here, you get them all. No cherry picking".
The other option, which I never did was an excel sheet. After every order add to it what you are putting on the shelf. Check it before placing an order to see what you already have. But this falls under the category of don't spend too much time chasing a couple of tees to save $5 off your next order.
I'm sure this works for folks mainly doing larger orders who have a policy of expected loss during production and are printing round estimates for sizes etc. My jobs are frequently small and specific sizes for specific people, often there will be only a single shirt for a particular size/color and it is for a specific person. I will order an extra of that shirt just in case something goes wrong even though it is rare. I would rather spend those extra $3 and not have to resetup the screens later for one shirt or tell a client that person doesnt get a shirt because there was an error. For me it is more efficient in the long run, and I usually end up using those shirts within 6 months, even for weird colors. I definitely have some weird brands/styles that have been stored for a few years, and usually at some point I either use them for personal stuff or for test prints if I am confident I will just never use them again.
-
My question would be...what are most folks using for their accounting software? There should be inventory functionality within that system...even if it's Quickbooks (I hate Quickbooks...but that's not the issue).
-
This is the beginning of it..........eight rows deep
-
Most of us can see the issues with opening the catalog but most of us don't do sales exclusively. Most of us here are at least a little more production minded than the SRI Salesperson and I've tried really hard to break it down so they can understand how something so meaningless in their mind can affect the entire process. The G42000 fiasco is still happening on a regular basis after I sat them all down and showed them the issues we have in printing them and how it essentially adds twice the time to printing them or an additional screen yet 2 weeks later it's like we never had the discussion. We print on so many different types of shirts it's ridiculous.
-
It's interesting to see the way this dilemma is handles depending on your market. We're probably closer to Tony. We decide what garments our customers can order, for the most part. We carry inventory of a good number of styles and colors. Racked similar to Tony. Boxed and labeled. Few hands are allowed to touch this stock. Then there are the little swings where , like right now we have a good amount of red and royal garments we normally wouldn't have (Go Cards and Royals) Blank inventory is almost a living,breathing part of the business. But having a few pieces here and there to keep track of? Not really worth the time or effort.
-
Try telling that to my anal Accounting dept! End of year= everything in the bldg. must be counted; requiring an entire shut down.
-
Try telling that to my anal Accounting dept! End of year= everything in the bldg. must be counted; requiring an entire shut down.
Every year on my tax forms for the business, I have to list an amount for inventory at the end of the year (which also becomes the inventory I begin with for the next. So yeah, I can see your accountant taking that seriously.
-
Necessary evil, yes.
-
We try to keep minimal stock and use it by years end some how, even if just for test prints and shop shirts.
My question is, have you seen shirts go bad? Our backstock is upstairs in the hottest part of the building, so I'm wondering if that's it.
But white shirts turn a dingy beige, develop oil spots, etc. It's weird.
On a similar note, AA has been putting out some of the worst garbage I've ever seen lately.
-
When we first opened we had a customer that bought 5K blank white shirts and was going to be printing different designs on them throughout the next year or so. They ended up printing about 1K of those shirts and then we stopped hearing from the guy, sent emails and phone messages about all the shirts we had stocked for him and after 2 years of no return communication from him I just started using them for test prints and if we needed any large or XL white shirts for anything (which was only half a dozen times a year at best). The last 2500 or so were not near as white as they were and they definitely started turning dingy like EB said. They were beefy t's and they also started to get more "canvas-ee" and stiffer.
-
I really expected one of you smart ass young technophiles to tell us about your inventory label printing program and companion smart phone app so even when on the beach at Cancun, you can check and see if you have two XL Jade G2000's!
I have a semi-working pantry inventory system that uses a barcode scanner. You scan your groceries when you get them home and put them up and then you scan them as you use them. Need to go shopping? Print out a grocery list and go. You tell it what "levels" of inventory you want to keep up with.
It is supposed to give you good and great prices so you know when you find a "sale" if it's REALLY a sale... but never got that far. Hell, I never actually used it other then as a proof of concept. :)