Retailers – if you’re managing inventory from a spreadsheet, we can guarantee that you won’t be having sweet dreams of Sugar Plum Fairies this holiday season. Sure, it might make sense for a small business to use a spreadsheet when first starting up – it’s inexpensive and easy to use for retailers with low order quantities – however, as inventory expands and sales increase, updating these spreadsheets becomes a daunting and time-consuming task. Just ask our client BillyTheTree.

According to Hidden Profit Prophet, poor inventory management is one of the top ten reasons businesses fail. If that’s not reason enough to convince you that managing inventory from a spreadsheet is a thing of the past, we’ve come up with a few more reasons.

Tasks done manually are prone to errors. When entering numerical information repeatedly, there’s bound to be a typo somewhere. This error not only creates misleading inventory data, but it also results in overselling or underselling items, translating into missed sales opportunities.

Manual entry prevents awareness of real-time data. There’s no such thing as halftimes, pause buttons, or intermissions when it comes to the products that continue to sell while you’re updating your inventory data. Meaning that while you’re typing away in spreadsheets, the last product may have been sold online or bagged in the store. That lack of real-time inventory data generates an inaccurate representation of inventory, and if a customer orders a product online, only to be notified later on that it’s out-of-stock, it’s easy for them to turn to your competitors – in one click!

Spreadsheet data is useless. Forecasting future inventory demand with spreadsheet data can be tricky and time-consuming. Make better use of inventory data with forecasting and reporting tools that go beyond the spreadsheet.

Time is wasted and overall productivity is reduced. Time spent manually entering inventory data could be spent managing other areas of your retail operations. Spreadsheets don’t scale with your business and can’t talk to your other systems, such as your accounting or point-of-sale software.

With a centralized, automated system like SalesWarp, you can take control of your inventory and avoid spreadsheet nightmares. Plus, with a cloud-based system, you can access your inventory data from anywhere, at any time – all you need is an internet connection. Let SalesWarp handle the boring stuff so that you can focus on what’s most important – building your business and delighting your customers.