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Inventory Management Systems

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INVENTORY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Joshua Crisp
Prof. Raman Marwah
CIS210
10 October, 2012

Manually tracking items in a store can be a waste of time and money. Most small businesses today use some type of automated inventory system that automatically updates inventory after point of sale (POS). This is especially important on high demand items that need to be reordered in a timely matter. First we need to look at the equipment, cost, and maintenance involved in adding an automated business system to the store. The vendor I choose was Wasp Barcode Technology Systems.
EQUIPMENT
First, we will look at the equipment necessary to implement a new inventory management system. To keep it simple we will need: * Software * UPC barcode printer * Labels * Scanner
The software will tie into the POS system and automatically track sales, returns, and inventory levels. The software I suggest will alert you when inventory levels are low and need to be reordered. Every product will have a barcode that tells the software an item has been removed from the inventory or added to the inventory. Initially we will have to load the software with data about what products are associated with each barcode and print the barcodes to attach to the products. The scanner will be used to tell the software what items are being purchased or inventoried. COST
After identifying what equipment we will use we can see how much the equipment and implementation will cost. * People- no need to add more people * Hardware/software 1. Software- $129.00/ 1 license 2. UPC printer- $384.00 plus ink 3. Labels-$50.00 per roll will be an ongoing cost 4. Scanner- $200.00 * Training- familiarization of software will not take long * Licenses/fees- software will require you to purchase additional licenses for additional computers. * Consulting expenses- no consulting will be required * Facility- this will be implemented in house
Some of the costs to purchase the equipment will be made up for in time. Tracking inventory and asset management will be automated whereas before it had to be done manually. Wasp Technologies offers a trial to use to see if the system will work for your business.
MAINTENANCE
Maintenance of this system should be minimal. The vendor will have updates to any software glitches or fixes that will need to be downloaded and installed on the system. There will also be a need to add any new products that are not already assigned a barcode. All other maintenance will be to keep label and ink in stock to print UPC barcode labels.
CONCLUSION
The problem with manually tracking inventory is the amount of time it takes to account for changes. The scope was to introduce automated inventory management with the constraint being cost. During fact finding we identified an easy solution that would utilize the current POS. After analyzing the data we concluded it would be feasible to add the inventory management system to save time. With a new inventory management system we can track changes and get alerted when high demand products are getting low. This new system is low maintenance, easy to use and most importantly affordable.

Works Cited
Gary B. Shelly, H. J. (2012). System Analysis and Design. Mason: Cengage.
Inventory Control System. (n.d.). BarcodesInc - Barcode Printer, Barcode Scanner, Point of Sale, Mobile Computing and RFID Experts. Retrieved October 21, 2012, from http://www.barcodesinc.com/articles/inventory-control-system.htm
Inventory Control and Inventory Software by Wasp Barcode Technologies. (n.d.). Barcode Scanner, Barcode Software, Asset Tracking, Inventory Software, & Time and Attendance. Retrieved October 21, 2012, from http://www.waspbarcode.com/inventory_control/

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