SkanBan - Inventory Replenishment System

- The Inventory Replenishment System that let's you:

REDUCE your customer's order processing costs using a proven Inventory Re-Ordering System – regardless of the items they purchase!
Significantly Reduce the TIME Involved in Placing, Entering, Receiving and Processing Orders for repetitively used MROP Products
Enable your customer to drastically reduce their costs of possession by “right-sizing” their inventory and re-engineering processes to achieve lowest costs
Streamline the way you and your customer do business together
Allows you to focus resources on process and product improvements versus making the sale.

– Tell me how it works

Here are the general steps to set up a program. The key to the program’s success is the mutual understanding between you and your customer that you will reduce their total cost of procurement and acquisition while maintaining competitive (but not always the lowest) prices across the board. See the accompanying Power Point presentation to learn more about new ways and methods to talk to customers about their #1 concern – lowering cost! And how achieves this!

Step 1 – With your customer, develop a list of repetitively purchased items (generally an item must be purchased 4+ times per year to be considered repetitive - this number will vary based on critical items and customer needs)

Determine the normal order quantity for each item based on achieving efficiently high inventory turns for your customer, approximately 12-18 turns per year; this becomes the new “release” quantity that will get triggered by the card The best way to determine this is to ask the customer if they have “usage” data based on handing out the item versus “purchase” data which only gives buying history…the two many times are not in sync which is why usage data is far more accurate.
- Most manufacturers turn their indirect material inventory only 2 times per year

Step 2 – an individual “” card, the size of a credit card, is made for each item. On the card is the following information:

Item description
Customer part # (if applicable)
Release Quantity (as determined in Step 1 above)
Inventory location – where the item is stored within the plant
A bar code that identifies the specific item

Step 3 – Re-order process

To simplify, let’s use an example. Your customer uses a ¼ -20 Tap at a historical usage rate of approximately 24 taps per month. You and your customer agree that he will “release” 12 taps from you every time the in-plant inventory hits 12.
In the storage location for this tap, 12 taps are placed in a plastic bag along with the card for the item. All the other ¼-20 taps are in the same storage drawer but not in the plastic bag. Operators use these “loose” taps and when there are only 12 left, which means the operator or crib attendant now opens the plastic bag for the first time, gets the tap, and removes the card.
The card gets set aside for use later; where the card is placed after it gets removed from the bag is up to you and your customer as to what makes sense.
The card then eventually gets “read” by our barcode reader that is connected to a PC. The information in the barcode is then sent to you as an “order or release” for 12 taps.
Of course, one of the primary value adds to this program is that you efficiently manage your inventory to replenish this tap (and all other products designated to have inventory) by shipping same day or next
When the customer receives your 12 taps (which you conveniently send in a new plastic bag), the customer inserts the card for that item into the bag, puts it back in the storage location with the other taps and the process starts all over again.

Yeah…It’s as simple as that! No special computer or training is required. The only requirement is a PC with the ability to get on to the Internet. We provide you with an internet address that is pass-worded and secure.

You can have a countless variations of this simple program to meet other specific customer needs, such as:

Invoicing your customer by department, cell or other designated area
Have cards made for slow moving items where no inventory is expected at your facility but the customer wants ease of ordering when the item is needed.
Providing customers with reports on who used what based on the amount of data input provided when the card is scanned.
Indicating order quantity at the time of scan versus a predetermined release quantity - this is recommended only for non-inventoried items as difficult to know what to stock otherwise and your service levels fails if quantity always changing.

- What’s Involved?

When you purchase and subscribe to our service, here is what we provide;

A bar code reader that easily attaches to a PC

bar coded cards for each MROP item identified to be on the program

Daily processing of the “swipes” by your customer with a download to you via email, EDI, fax or, for an additional one time fee, customized software for electronic entry into your distribution system (P21, etc – contact Bill Chapman @ for details)

We can also send a confirming fax or email back to your customer that summarizes the items ordered that day.

- How Do I Get Started?

First, we recommend that you make a cost savings presentation to your potential customer taking advantage of the Power Point presentation we make available at no charge to you in our DOWNLOADS. We strongly urge you to customize the presentation to your specific customer and their needs.

After you get customer buy-in and commitment, decide which items you want covered by the program. We prefer you send us the data on each item in a file format like Excel to avoid data entry errors. An Excel template is available in the DOWNLOADS area

Normally, the data includes

Customer part number, if any
Your Part number
Description of item
Storage location at the customer’s plant if you want this feature

(remember, you can input the quantity if necessary, but we suggest starting with release quantities and adjusting later based on usage)

We then create a credit card sized card for each item and ship these and the barcode reader to you.
You or your customer connect the barcode reader to a PC, access the customized internet web address and start using the program.

ORDER PROCESSING AND INVENTORY REPLENISHMENT CANNOT GET SIMPLER THAN THIS!

Distributors across the country use to help customers control inventory and reduce costs. can be used stand-alone or as part of a larger inventory management program that includes other components such a vending. Distributors using the program range in size from $1 to $50 million in sales and is being used to manage inventory and sales from $30,000 to $3,000,000.

With the system, paper is virtually eliminated while a defined audit trail is maintained.

Changes are easy to make – just send us an email. We will ship you a new card within 5-7 working days. If the change is only a description or release quantity update, the old card will still work (and you can write the changes on the card) while the new card is in transit.