Trivialize Your Stock Losses By Using FIFO & FEFO!
The eCommerce industry cannot always work as per your expectations. You have to work a lot in terms of managing your business on any eComm marketplace. There are several essential aspects of this industry that you must have to take care of. Inventory management is one of the most vital aspects of the eComm business, and you must take care of your inventories. Damage and non-inventory restocking and down stock can impact your business drastically. These constitute a significant threat to your online business and impact customer satisfaction and your revenue. These days this enormous market is witnessing hefty growth in selling fashion apparel, beauty products, health, and personal care products, etc. Thus, as a seller, if you are selling these products, you can not afford the damage of stock losses, and to neutralize that, you need to take advantage of online inventory management software such as eVanik OWS. This software can help you reconcile the inventory process due to its centralized functionality and save you from the Oos situation. Apart from this, today, in this blog, you will learn about FIFO and FEFO, which can help you eliminate the chances of stock losses.
What is FIFO & FEFO?
Some of you have been familiar with these terms, but some may not, especially those who initially started their online business. So without wasting our time, let’s quickly know about these two aspects of inventory management.
FIFO
- FIFO refers to “first come, first out” in this method, you must first sell those products that arrive in stock. This method allows you to diminish the chances of selling outdated products. You can implement this method in your online business to avoid loss because of obsolete inventory. If you sell health care, beauty, and edible products, you must go for this method because these kinds of products have an expiry date, and not selling them at the right time can negatively affect your business. The FIFO method can ship your products in neat and clean packaging and help satisfy your customers.
FEFO
- FEFO refers to the term first expired first out. In this particular method, you must first sell those products near expiration. If you deliver those products to your valuable customers that are nearly to expire, they might return you. However, in this method, you need to evaluate all the products according to their expiry date and then ship those products first that are close to the window of the expiry date. Implementing this method to your eCommerce business can ensure the delivery of high-quality products to your customers and thus increase your market credibility and revenue simultaneously.
Several Consequences of Not Following FIFO & FEFO
Just in case you are not taking care of these two aspects of inventory management, you may have to bear the following charges.
- Charges of product expiration in your stock.
- Immature additional charges of inventory.
- Charges related to damaged order returns.
- You may have to pay the charges for the products that have signs of devaluation.
Hence, if you follow FIFO and FEFO stock rotation methods, you may avoid paying these charges. So it is advisable to practice these methods from time to time.
Four Fantastic Advantages of FIFO & FEFO
- Knock Off the Issue of Obsolete Inventory
Obsolete inventory can affect your overall business in terms of severe product losses. Outdated, expired, and damaged products in stock can not only make you pay additional charges, but if such products get shipped to your customers, it can also ruin your market image. However, executing the FIFO and FEFO methods to your inventory can eliminate such issues and let you sell the products exactly before they expire or get outdated. However, suppose you are not able to follow these methods on time. In that case, you can take the help of inventory management software such as eVanik OWS, which can help you reconcile inventory and save your precious money and time efficiently.
- Enhance the Customer Satisfaction
It is highly understandable that delivering expired products to your customers can weaken your customer base and mitigate their trust in your business. On the other hand, if you sell outdated products on various marketplaces, there are chances of a minimal sale because customers may not buy those products. In both scenarios, it can highly affect your business in so many ways. But implementation of FIFO and FEFO can minimize the chance of costumes getting damaged, low-quality, expired products. It can help improve their confidence in you and let you achieve your revenue generation goal.
- Reduces the Impact of Economical Surge
In our Indian economic scenario, it is pervasive for the economic surge rate to hike up and go down any time of the year. So to escape such a situation, stock rotation of the FIFO and FEFO methods can help you immensely in selling those products that were produced first or come in your stock first. It can increase your business revenue effectively. However, if you lack in selling products on time, there is a possibility of increasing and decreasing the actual price. In both situations, your eCommerce business can suffer.
- Helps in Managing the Warehouse Space
FIFO and FEFO methods are not necessarily required only for the big business; even small businesses that are stocking their products at their own warehouse should also implement this method to manage their warehouse space accurately. It can help segregate the products as per their production date and make it relatively easier to manage warehouse space adequately. So these were the advantages of stock rotation, but if you are confused about choosing these methods for your business, let me tell you that if you sell edible items, fashion apparel, health products, and beauty products, then FIFO is the best-tested method for you. Similar to FIFO, the FEFO method should be followed if you are selling such products that contain an expiry date.
Conclusion
Now, you must understand exactly what FIFO & FEFO inventory methods are. You can implement these in your business if you want to minimize the rate of stock losses and consolidate your entire supply chain. In this regard, inventory management software can benefit you by effectively executing these two methods. Software like eVanik OWS has an integration feature that integrates with your ERP system and reconciles the entire inventory process. It provides centralized inventory management support, integrates with multiple eCommerce platforms, and automatically diminishes the disadvantages of poor inventory management. So if you are new to this business or even running an established one, you must get along with such software and follow the FIFO and FEFO methods effectively. It can help you ensure that you ship only fresh and desirable products to your customers every time. In such a way, you can increase your business’s value in prominent marketplaces.
