Consumer trends drive demand in the food and beverage industry. Many companies struggle to keep up with the latest desires for sustainability and dietary alternatives. At the same time, food safety is a higher concern for consumers than ever before. These trends re-emphasize the importance of inventory visibility in the industry, and that starts with product tracking.
Warehouse inventory tracking using software tailored to food and beverage management gives businesses the ability to detect and solve issues in their supply chain in real time. These inventory tracking solutions can monitor transportation, detect supply and demand changes, monitor warehouse capacities, and more. To maintain compliance and customer satisfaction at the speed that modern consumer trends demand, automated inventory management is bringing food and beverage companies up to speed with the rest of the economy.
Why businesses should update their inventory management
Outdated tracking methods leave little room for error in 2023. Many businesses leave their teams out of the loop regarding demand forecasting, supply tracking, warehousing stocking issues, transportation delays, and more.
Software solutions that provide real-time inventory visibility smooth out common workflow issues regardless of location. Businesses save labor by automating supply tracking, giving them more resources to devote to strategic planning. Additionally, manual inventory management results in incorrect data about 37% of the time. Automation takes human error out of the equation of inventory tracking, while modernizing the entire supply chain process.
How inventory management software modernizes supply chains
Warehouse inventory tracking no longer has to rely on manual product counts or Excel spreadsheets. Inventory management software increases real-time visibility in the food and beverage industry by:
Enhancing data collection – Management software allows businesses to continually collect inventory data, even when on-site hardware loses its internet connection. Many software solutions use cloud-based servers to make data continuously available to anyone with access.
Streamlining the barcoding process – Modern software solutions are interconnected within a business through apps that can be accessed on smartphones, tablets, and computers. Mobile barcoding allows businesses to more easily track products through their supply chain, enabling a quicker response to a recall or simply maintaining day-to-day visibility.
Ensuring compliance – Automating barcoding and data entry processes allows modern food and beverage businesses to more easily ensure compliance with industry standards and recall procedures. Products are more traceable than they ever could be using paper-based collection methods.
Enhancing customer satisfaction – In food and beverage, a business’s response to a recall, its fulfillment times, and its response to trends in consumer demand can make or break its relationship with customers. Real-time visibility enables real-time responses to maintain this relationship in a changing market.
The takeaway for businesses
Food and beverage businesses should weigh the options for automation against their plans for growth, in order to determine the inventory management solution that meets their objectives. Modern inventory software often allows businesses to pay for the features they need, allowing them to scale their visibility with their inventory growth, while promoting collaboration within their management teams. Inventory management now needs to be mobile and visible in real-time to meet the demands of an automated, trend-reliant industry. These software solutions fulfill that need, so workers don’t have to.