As a manufacturer, one of the biggest areas where you can cut costs is inventory. The problem is, inventory levels can fluctuate a lot depending on how much insight you have into demand, supplier performance, shop floor operations, and more.
Your team can spend an inordinate amount of time trying to get their hands around inventory control if you don’t have processes and a system in place that captures each step materials take from the time it enters your plant to the time it ships to the customer. This was the case for Wisco Industries, a metal stamper and fabricator that produces components for the food industry.
Like many small to mid-sized manufacturing companies, the company had to do inventory planning manually. With its fiscal year-end in June, planning for inventory began in the middle of May, and included writing out 9,000 inventory tags and adjusting inventory by hand. Locating materials on the shop floor would often take up to 20 minutes.
What does this have to do with the Fourth of July?
Well, Wisco’s Controller knows exactly. He was responsible for conducting physical inventories for nearly 35 years—which meant he missed any celebrations during the U.S. holiday weekend.
Then the company implemented the Plex Manufacturing Cloud.
Now Wisco manages inventory in real time, reducing the year-end audit process from weeks to just a few hours. Tighter inventory control has also resulted in less inventory on the shop floor, better material handling, and faster lead times.
Moving inventory management to the cloud not only resulted in a 20 percent reduction in inventory, but a Controller who can enjoy the Fourth of July without worrying about a labor-intensive physical inventory.
Interested in real-time inventory management? Watch a demo of the Plex Manufacturing Cloud.
