Warehousing Operations
- Warehousing operations refers to the processes that take place in a warehouse revolving around the movement of goods and tracking inventory.
- The goal of warehouse operations is to satisfy customers’ needs and requirements while utilizing space, equipment, and labor effectively.
- Receiving involves control over the delivery to your warehouse of the correct quantity of the desired product – of the right quality at the right time. This process can in turn be broken into smaller ones:
- placing a purchase order,
- preparing space in the warehouse,
- unloading (manual or automated),
- verification,
- filling in the database, etc.
- Putaway is delivering goods to the optimal place in the warehouse. Here the correct identification of each SKU (stock keeping unit) and getting it to the most relevant spot is important.
- Picking is the process of collecting goods from the storage place according to the customer’s order. It is thought of as the costliest, most time-consuming, and most error-prone.
- Packing is putting the ordered items together, checking their quality, and getting the product ready for shipment.
- Shipping or dispatching is sending goods to the customer and making sure they are delivered safely and on time.
- Returns is something most companies wish would never happen, but unfortunately, they are also a part of the game due to various reasons.