Keeping Count

Herb Billings, Vice President, Technology Strategy at Datascan, is back alongside host Tyler Kern for another episode of Herb’s Hot Takes – this time diving into the measurable negative effects organizations can experience when they exhibit poor inventory accuracy.

Every retailer the world over is affected by inventory accuracy either positively or negatively. As we learned in the first episode of Herb’s Hot Takes, those retailers that pay close attention to their inventory and conduct accurate counts can realize significant bottom-line benefits.

However, the opposite is also true. There are five clear impacts of poor inventory accuracy – lost sales, lost customers, increased inventory costs, wasted labor and lower employee morale.

This is especially true in an age where omnichannel strategies are becoming more critical every day. Traditionally, retailers would either have an item or not, and they could potentially call another location to verify that an item is in stock for a customer to pick up there.

This manual verification hid the actual inaccuracies behind the scenes of many retailers – inaccuracies that the omnichannel world of today is exposing in droves.

Retailers can respond, but it takes a greater commitment to inventory accuracy and to leveraging data in a more insightful way to make it happen.

The accuracy of inventory can quickly degrade when it comes to retailers, particularly those with many stores. That makes inventory accuracy critical, especially considering that companies have invested heavily in omnichannel methods and adapted their strategies to meet consumer demand.

Herb Billings is the Vice President, Technology Strategy at Datascan – and he’s got some hot takes.

On this inaugural episode of Herb’s Hot Takes, Billings leaned into years of experience studying the impact of inventory accuracy on retailers to deliver his first hot take, which may open listeners’ eyes to the very real impact of poor inventory accuracy on a business’s bottom line and beyond.

Like any industry, retail is now being forced to reckon with an emphasis on data – and analysis of that data – unlike any we’ve seen before.

Retailers are in a position to understand more about their supply chain, customers, store experience, marketing and more than ever before, but they need solutions that can help them make the most of that mountain of potential insights.

From an inventory perspective, Datascan is ready with solutions that can help retailers do just that.

On this episode of Datascan’s “Keeping Count,” President and CEO Adrian Thomas once again joined host Tyler Kern, this time to tackle to ever-evolving world of retail data and analytics.

“Data in retail has been limited, prior to the last two to three years, to [point of sale] data, maybe delivery data and supply chain data, and, obviously, some inventory accuracy that we can provide,” Thomas said. “From the inventory accuracy standpoint, now – what we can start to show retailers is what is actually going on with their inventory in the store.”

Traditionally, inventory counts have been performed maybe once or twice a year, meaning that the data is only relevant for a short period of time. In the current retail landscape and as we turn an eye to the future, finding a way to determine more constant data and convert that into meaningful trends will be key.

Datascan can help, particularly as retailers attempt to overcome challenges with inventory counting, such as pure volume, returns associated with a boom in online shopping, and more.

Datascan is an industry leader in inventory counting, helping modern retailers navigate the plethora of supply chain, inventory, stock management and data-related challenges they need to in order to thrive in the modern retail landscape.

On “Keeping Count,” the company will help shape the conversation around those trends, offering leading insights primed to help retailers and more proactively and efficiently get their inventory under control.

This inaugural episode saw Datascan President and CEO Adrian Thomas join host Tyler Kern to introduce viewers to the show, talk about Datascan as a whole, and align his company’s mission with that of the show – to help elevate the way the world views inventory management.

“We’ve been in the business of inventory counting in retail stores [for 50 years],” Thomas said. “Inventory counting – and the importance of inventory counting – is changing. We have a lot of experience in the industry, and we feel that it’s a good time for us to start to share some of that and explore the relevance of inventory counting as retail is transforming.”

That transformation, accelerated by COVID-19, will lead to conversations around the impact of buy online, pick up in store, or BOPIS, curbside pickup, general inventory trends, the interaction between online presences and brick-and-mortar stores, and more.