Maintaining a well-organized automotive parts inventory is critical to ensuring that your parts department, and your dealership as a whole, operates efficiently.
Your automotive parts inventory is one of the most valuable assets your company owns, and often the largest. By taking the time to implement effective processes to better maintain your inventory, your parts department will profit, both financially and non-monetarily.
Here are just five ways a well-maintained automotive parts inventory can benefit you, your department and your dealership.
1. Ordering
Accurate inventory management helps your parts department maintain stock. If your records are correct, you will be able to track historical trends, over time, to determine optimal restocking levels and order dates. This enables your inventory system to effectively notify parts personnel when a part needs to be re-ordered.
Feeling confident that your inventory records are accurate improves the accuracy of your parts orders and ensures your dealership is efficiently stocked, at all times.
2. Resource Allocation
Well-maintained inventory records ensure that you’re optimizing all areas of your business, including space, capital, productivity and profits.
Having too much inventory can take up valuable storage, increase the risk of obsolescence and divert capital that would be better used elsewhere. On the other hand, a shortage in inventory can have an adverse effect on your lead times.
3. Service Scheduling
By maintaining an accurate parts inventory record, you can confidently ascertain how long it will take to get the parts you need to fix a customer’s vehicle. At a glance, you will be able to determine whether or not you have what you need to fix a customer’s vehicle or whether the customer will have to bring their vehicle in another day - after the parts have been ordered and delivered.
This will allow your staff to schedule service appointments productively.
4. Customer Service
If your inventory records are properly maintained, you will be able to answer parts inquiries and fill customer orders faster. If a customer has to wait longer for a response or finds out that a part they were told was in stock isn’t, it can have a negative effect on their opinion of your company.
If you are able to quickly determine whether or not the auto part is in stock and, if necessary, how long it will take to obtain, your customer will feel more confident in your business, improving their overall satisfaction.
5. Time Management
Effective inventory tracking means that your staff will spend less time looking for parts and more time doing tasks that are focused on improving the operations of your business, and, as a result, increasing profits.
Perhaps they will use the time to organize parts to increase efficiency and access, or maybe they will find ways to reduce inventory costs by researching new vendors and working out better deals with current suppliers.
No matter what your parts department’s goals are, a properly maintained inventory is key to the successful operations of your dealership or service shop.
For more information about the benefits of a well-maintained inventory or to find out what you can do to effectively manage your automotive parts inventory, contact us today!