How many sources does your parts department use?
During our latest PartsEdge webinar, we shared that the average dealerships we see have somewhere between six and ten sources. In many cases, dramatically different types of inventory are being managed together under the same settings.
That matters because not every part should be managed the same way.
During the webinar, we used milk and canned asparagus to illustrate the problem.
Milk sells quickly and is perishable. Canned asparagus moves much more slowly and has a long shelf life. Put them under the same inventory rules and you have a problem: set the day supply for milk and you could end up with a three- or four-month supply of asparagus. Set it for the asparagus and you risk running out of milk.
Now replace milk with oil filters and asparagus with tape stripes.
Different parts have different demand patterns, pricing considerations, phase-in and phase-out requirements, and stocking needs. Your source structure gives you the ability to manage those differences.
When properly structured, the DMS can dynamically manage inventory based on the rules you establish instead of requiring the Parts Manager to continually compensate for a one-size-fits-all setup. The webinar outlined how dynamic source structure can help reduce excess value, build inventory breadth, identify forced stock, control special orders, improve pricing, save time, and increase the accuracy of management reports.
There is a lot more behind source structure than simply creating more sources.
Watch our latest PartsEdge webinar or the full discussion, including examples of how different inventory categories can be structured inside the DMS.
Then register for our next webinar to continue the conversation and get more inventory strategies you can put to work in your parts department.