What is the difference between Warehouse Management & Inventory Management?

What is the difference between Warehouse Management & Inventory Management?

The terms “inventory management” and “warehouse management” are sometimes mistakenly used interchangeably as they both deal with operations and products of industries. Despite their few similarities, there are many notable differences between warehouse and inventory management systems.

The terms “inventory management” and “warehouse management” are sometimes mistakenly used interchangeably as they both deal with operations and products of retail industry. Both inventory and warehouse management systems enable companies to use barcoding devices to track parts and products within the warehouse, monitor product levels, pick, pack, and ship items, manage various locations, receive orders into inventory, and perform cycle counts. Despite their few similarities, there are many notable differences between warehouse and inventory management systems.

  • Inventory management is usually the first step taken before warehouse management.
  • Inventory management deals with total amount of inventory in one specific location.
  • Inventory management tracks transactions related to inventory and provide total amount of stock for each specific storage location.
  • Inventory Management is about managing the stocks in the warehouse and ensuring that the proper flow of stocks is maintained in a supply chain through the order fulfillment process. 
  • Warehouse management focuses on managing the entire storage system within the warehouse
  • Warehouse management tracks location of specific items in the warehouse
  • WMS deals with production supply, sales and distribution, and quality management and integral to ongoing operations of the retail organization.
  • The most significant difference between the two systems is the human factor.
  • Inventory management focuses only on product or stock, warehouse management involves managing employees and shipping or freight personnel operating in the warehouse environment.
  • Warehouse Management is about managing the whole facility in which the products are stored, including the workforce, the equipment, technology to be used, and the inventory itself. 

warehouse

Related Links

Creation Date Sunday, 01 January 2023 Hits 3533

You May Also Like

  • Warehouse Consolidation

    Warehouse Consolidation

    Transport operations are often divided into full load and part load and due to economies of scale, the unit costs are higher for part loads. Our customer needs several part loads delivering, so it can reduce costs by consolidating these into full loads. Then it gets all the part loads delivered to a warehouse near the suppliers, consolidates them into full loads, and pays the lower costs of full-load transport to its operations.

  • Overview of Warehouse Processes

    Overview of Warehouse Processes

    The basic function of a warehouse is to store goods. This means that they receive deliveries from suppliers, do any necessary checking and sorting, store the materials until it is dispatched to customers. Traditionally warehouses were seen as places for the long-term storage of goods. Now organizations want to optimize their customer experience and try to move materials quickly through the supply chain, so the role of warehousing has changed.

  • Warehouse Returns Process

    Warehouse Returns Process

    In the normal course of business, customers are likely to return orders from time to time due to various reasons and business should design processes the manage and accept such returns. A well designed returns management process can reduce costs and issues associated with returns or exchanges.

  • Warehouse Management

    Warehouse Management

    Warehouse management and distribution logistics involve the physical warehouse where products are stored, as well as the receipt and movement of goods takes place. Warehouse management aims to control the storage and movement of products and materials within a warehouse. These operations include the receipting of inwards goods, tracking, stacking and stock movement through the warehouse.

  • Types of Order Picking Methods in the Warehouse

    Types of Order Picking Methods in the Warehouse

    There are many different types of picking in a warehouse and each one works as a customized solution for each business. Depending on the size of your warehouse and inventory, the manpower you have on hand, and the number of customer orders made each day, there may be certain methods that are more efficient for you than others.

  • Overview of Third-Party Logistics

    Overview of Third-Party Logistics

    Third-party logistics (abbreviated as 3PL, or TPL) is an organization's use of third-party businesses to outsource elements of its distribution, warehousing, and fulfillment services. A third-party logistics provider (3PL) is an asset-based or non-asset based company that manages one or more logistics processes or operations (typically, transportation or warehousing) for another company.

  • What is a Warehouse & why companies need them?

    What is a Warehouse & why companies need them?

    All organizations hold stocks. In virtually every supply chain, gaps exist between when something is produced and when a customer is ready to buy or receive it.  Stocks occur at any point in the supply chain where the flow of materials is interrupted. This implies that products need to be stored during this period of gap.

  • Cross Docking Process

    Cross Docking Process

    One of the warehousing best practices that retailers like Walmart, Amazon, and Target have adopted is known as cross-docking. During this process the inbound products are unloaded at a distribution center and then sorted by destination, and eventually reloaded onto outbound trucks. In real parlance, the goods are not at all warehoused but just moved across the dock (hence the name).

  • Warehouse Count Process

    Warehouse Count Process

    Inventory is money, and hence businesses need to perform physical inventory counts periodically to make sure that their inventory records are accurate. The traditional approach to conducting inventory counts is to shut down a facility during a slow time of year to count everything, one item at a time. This process is slow, expensive, and (unfortunately) not very accurate.

  • Business Case of Multiple Warehouses

    Business Case of Multiple Warehouses

    Adding extra warehouses to business provides many benefits such as reducing shipping costs, increasing storage capacity, and having warehouses for specific purposes to simplify overall warehouse management. Multiple warehouses allow you to organize your inventory in a way that helps your business be more effective.

Explore Our Free Training Articles or
Sign Up to Start With Our eLearning Courses

Subscribe to Our Newsletter


© 2023 TechnoFunc, All Rights Reserved