Tegger wrote:
Molly wrote in news:583f6164-8d8b-4092-
:
Is it more profitable to stop stocking the shelves a month before an
inventory like Home Depot does so that you have less to count so that
you don’t have to pay as much in wages for the inventory personnel or
to keep stocking the shelves so that you make-up the time/money you
lose doing the inventory by selling as much as possible?
Inventory and shrinkage (theft) monitoring are considered routine costs of
doing business.
It would be more profitable to always have fully-stocked shelves so
consumers can buy things. Any retailer will tell you that the absolute
worst thing you can have happen at retail is to have empty shelves.
Agreed - I have 30 years in Retail Grocery.
Lack of stock means lack of sales. And those potential lost sales (plus
lost consumer confidence) would cost far more than the wages paid to
inventory that same product.
True, but there are limits, excess backstock can be very costly (product
going out of date, damaged, too many high theft items displayed thus
lost when boosted, and employee theft or grazing in the backroom).
Stores are rated by their sales per-square-foot of sales-floor space. Empty
shelves severely cut into that number. In fact, you can tell the better-run
stores because they're more likely to always have full shelves.
Our stores are measured by sales per man hour. Shrink is compared
against sales and lineal footage.
For examples of two retailers who are probably the best in the business at
keeping product on the shelf, see Staples and Costco.
By the way, shelves are stocked regularly as they empty, which can be up to
several times a day for very high-volume product.
Temperature control, service, in stock position, rotation, inventory
control, and anti-theft are all important.