Warehouse Management Guide

Warehouse Management Guide
By Mansi Aggarwal

Warehouse management is the art of movement and storage of materials throughout the warehouse. Warehouse management monitors the progress of products through the warehouse. It involves the physical warehouse infrastructure, tracking systems, and communication between product stations. Warehouse management deals with receipt, storage and movement of goods usually finished goods and includes functions like warehouse master record, item/ warehouse cross-reference lists and such things as on hand, allocated, transfers in process, transfer in process, transfer lead time, safety stock, fields for accumulating statistics by location.

A warehouse manager needs to perform several crucial functions such as overseeing and recording deliveries and pickups, loading and unloading materials and supplies, maintaining inventory records and tracking system, determining appropriate places for storage, rotating stock as needed and adjusting inventory levels to reflect receipts and disbursements. An individual handling the warehouse management needs to have knowledge about inventory control and warehousing systems, loading and unloading procedures, risky and materials storage and mathematical knowledge.

A warehouse management system is a critical component of an effective overall supply chain management systems solution. Warehouse management system began as a system to control movement and storage of materials within a warehouse. Today it even incorporates tasks such as light manufacturing, transportation management, order management, and entire accounting systems.

Implementation of Warehouse Management System (WMS) will provide you an increase in accuracy, reduction in labor costs if the labor employed to maintain the system is less than the labor saved on the warehouse floor and a greater ability to service the customer by reducing cycle times. WMS may not serve you with inventory reduction and greater storage capacity. An increase in accuracy and efficiency receiving process might lead to reduction in level of safety stock required. But the consequence of this reduction will hardly be visible to the overall inventory levels. WMS might just not affect the factors (lot sizing, lead times and demand variability) controlling the inventory levels. However WMS is instrumental in more efficient and organized that leads to increased storage capacity.

Lately in the field of warehouse management, Infor, the largest global enterprise software provider is developing solutions for the manufacturing and distribution industries. Infor’s management technology is meant for enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Infor technology can be used for single as well as multiple warehouses. It allows manufacturers and distributors to perceive and monitor the location of particular items within the facility. The technology is also extremely beneficial in ascertaining the size and weight of incoming shipments to set up the perfect way to transport and place them in the warehouse. The professional experts at Infor are planning to integrate it into Infor’s Microsoft.Net based ERP system for manufacturers.

Mansi Aggarwal recommends that you visit Warehouse Management for more information.

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Distribution Logistics and Warehouse Distribution: Finding The One For You

Distribution Logistics and Warehouse Distribution: Finding The One For You
By Gordon Petten

Distribution logistics play a valuable role in any warehouse distribution system. Every warehouse is unique, and thus has its own unique distribution logistics. It can be something as simple as the number of floors or something as complex as the computer system used. But whatever causes them to be unique, distribution logistics must be taken into account when designing any service which utilizes warehouse distribution.

It has been said that a retail business is only as good as its channel of distribution. It could be equally stated that distribution logistics are the current that makes that channel flow. Many managers make the mistake of creating a "one size fits all" approach to warehouse distribution. They believe that all warehouses should operate in essentially the same manner, and the way to achieve this uniformity is through uniform distribution logistics. Nothing could be further from the truth.

There are fundamental reasons for this.

Let us look at a simple example.

Say a firm has one warehouse which operates with two shifts for packers and shippers. The same firm also uses two other warehouses which have three shifts. Is it logical to simply put a third shift on the first warehouse so all the distribution logistics can conform? Of course not. There may be very good reasons that the first warehouse only has two shifts; and merely creating uniform distribution logistics for this warehouse may create more problems than it solves.

In addition, output rates are often seen as a sign of the success of the distribution logistic in any warehouse distribution scheme. However, again, even output rates only tell part of the story. You need to examine the full nature of each warehouse's distribution logistics to come to a determination of the logistical scheme which most suits that particular warehouse.

Distribution logistics in any warehouse distribution system should be viewed in much the same way individual workers are viewed. Some workers can work double shifts, but can only do this for a certain period of time -- before needing to take personal days. Others work better sticking to one shift, but rarely take personal or sick days. Which is the more valuable employee? Neither. Both perform their jobs in a manner the company can utilize, but both require different work patterns.

It is exactly the same way with the distribution logistics in any warehouse distribution system. What works in one warehouse, may not work in another. What optimizes the distribution systems in one warehouse may cause problems in another. However, this is not an excuse to allow retrograde practices to continue. If a certain warehouse is truly underperforming, something needs to be done; and uniformity could be the answer. This is merely to say that distribution logistics is not a "one size fits all" affair, and should not uniformly be treated as such. Each warehouse should be studied, its practices examined, and then decisions can be made.

Obviously, successful practices from other warehouses should be tried. But it is important to first examine why the variation in practice has occurred in this particular warehouse. It may possess certain values that initially went unnoticed. For these reasons, we feel that distribution logistics in a warehouse distribution system require some of the most care and attention of anything in the distribution chain. So think twice before suggesting uniformity. It may sound great at a board meeting, but its real world application could be truly disastrous. And that could have damaging effects not only on your business but your career as well.

And we would not want that, now would we?

Distribution logistics and Warehouse Distribution

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Warehouse Management

Warehouse Management
By Jennifer Bailey

Warehouse management is the technique of supervising the receiving, handling, storing, moving, packaging, and distributing of materials in and around the warehouse. They deal in finished goods and involve functions such as cross-reference lists and warehouse master records. On the other hand, there are other tasks such as allocation of the goods, transfer in process, safety of stock, acquiring statistics by location, and safety of stock, also maneuvered by the warehouse management. To supervise all the above functions, a warehouse manager is appointed, who is required to record and supervise deliveries and pickups, keep an account of the tracking systems, loading and unloading supplies and other materials. Amongst all the responsibilities, distribution of necessary stock to required places at accurate times is the most important task of the warehouse manager.

Warehouse managers must have appropriate knowledge of inventory measures and control, warehousing systems, material storage, unloading and loading techniques and mathematical knowledge. The warehouse management is an essential constituent and deals in effective distribution chain management system solutions. Today the term warehouse management also deals in accounting systems, transportation management, light manufacturing, and order manufacturing - apart from the traditional role of storage and delivery. Warehouse management systems (WMS) help to increase correctness by reducing the cost of labor and achieving greater ability to serve the consumers.

WMS, however, does not serve greater storage capacity or inventory decrease, and may not affect leading factors such as lot sizing, demand variability, and guide times. Various developed enterprises have emerged in the field of warehouse management, which provide software for development solutions that help manufacturing and distribution industries.

Various guidelines regarding the warehouse management are also available on the Internet. These sites are dedicated towards explaining the concept of warehouse management and making customers as well as warehouse owners understand the growing need for them. Detailed features of the warehouse management systems are discussed with apt case studies for better illustrations and comprehension of the customers. WMS software can also be downloaded either for free or a minimal cost from certain websites, thus, facilitating easy acquisition of the latest management tool.

Warehouse provides detailed information on Warehouse, Warehouse Management Software, Tire Warehouse, Furniture Warehouse and more. Warehouse is affiliated with Contract Warehousing.

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