Lessons Learned: Inventory Levels
The past couple weeks have been busy at Proforma Innovative Ideas. With marketing needs building up, many of our clients have begun to process orders that have been on the radar screen for quite some time. As orders have been processed, an interesting trend has shown up with many of our vendors…inventory availability issues.
In years past, inventory levels of popular items has never been a problem. Our vast network of suppliers have always had more than enough stock in warehouses across the US. This large supply of inventory allowed our clients to process orders at the last minute, with little worry that their first choice of products was going to be available. For the foreseeable future, this may not be the case.
As it turns out suppliers’ ability to stock large inventories was made possible by their ability to secure inexpensive credit terms from their banks and investors. As it has become increasingly difficult to secure credit, our suppliers have been forced to reduce inventory levels and delay the restocking of many items.
True Story:
Last week we received an order for 3,000 imprinted t-shirts. The client had been thinking about the project for quite some time and decided that it was time to move the order forward. They reviewed many shirt samples and clearly liked a specific shirt. As we began to process the order, it soon became clear that their were going to be some issues.
Evidently someone else fell in love with this shirt also. The mill we were expecting to supply the shirts had run out of stock in some of the colors we needed. We immediately began a search to see where we could source the shirts from, in time to meet our client’s event date. After two days of work, and by having shirts shipped from multiple locations, we were eventually able to find all of the shirts necessary to meet the client’s needs and the shirts were delivered on time. In this case, we were lucky, but I’m not sure that this will be the case every time.
Lesson Learned: For the foreseeable future, it appears that many promotional product manufacturers are going to be keeping lower inventory levels than in the past. What this means for Proforma Innovative Ideas and our clients is that we need to be planning ahead to avoid as many of these inventory issues as possible. While it will always be possible to fulfill the inevitable rush order, it may not be possible with the exact items that you want.
As a result, let’s work together to make sure that we allow enough time to properly plan your upcoming projects, reserve inventories and make your projects a success!
As always, you can visit our website at www.mylogopromo.com or give us a call at 317-823-9004.
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