After Holidays Organizing Cleaning Inventory Control

After Holidays, Organizing, Cleaning, and Inventory Control. 


Welcome to LilacsNDreams everyone, and happy to have you here. Well, here we are into our second week of the new 2012 year already! Holidays are over, cleaning has been done, things put back into their places for decorations, and now we are moving onto catching up on the computers, and with our online stores. I LOVE selling online, meeting other people, learning from others, sharing thoughts and ideas with others, and all of that wonderful stuff. 


Over Christmas I was able to spend a few hours with a very good friend of mine. MaryLouLavender*s. If you visited my LilacsNDreams Store page here with my blog you would have seen some of the items she had listed with her ebay store recently. It was great seeing her, and as always never enough time to go over everything, share everything, and cover all we would like to do, see, and talk about.

During our conversations we were discussing blogs, things we sell, ideas, and just all that sharing that feels good to do. The idea of organized inventory was brought up. How do you organize everything? What works, what doesn't work, and where do you begin? I know this is something many many of us struggle with in our homes to organize for our online stores, and also for just around the home too. How do you organize this, how do you organize that, what is the best way, and so on. 

You know, these are good questions and thoughts to be asking. As we grow with our online businesses our inventory becomes more, and there has to be a neutral way that is acceptable, and workable to keep organized, and to keep peace of mind with ourselves. Having it organized makes it so much easier to locate for when items sell, for when we list, doing inventory, and etc. I decided to look around a little, and see what others had to offer of what they do, and how they do things. Keep in mind, some of these ways do not always work for everyone as all of us have different kinds of inventory, and things that we sell. 


One of the popular ways I am seeing is to use tubs, and some shelves for each category, and items. Some use this sort of system for each month as they list. Some of the shelving was done with wire racks that are bought from Costco. Some found things with their home to repurpose, and use. The tubs could be colored, or some will use see through ones which enables them to better see what is inside the tub too.  Some mentioned that they used boxes as well.


On the top of the shelves some will use by putting their bubble wrap there, envelopes, USPS boxes, their supplies. It is best to keep enough in supplies for what is needed to help in organizing, and controling your system you have. On the tubs some will use removable address labels as stickers to notify what is in the tubs, or using a numbering system. Item tags are used on some with a bin number system. Along with the bin numbers some will also note the price paid for the item. Then, some will note the tubs with the item title along with the listing number too. Some will use print outs...like an inventory sheet for each tub notifying what is in it. Some sellers will choose to keep their items together by brand, and in alphabetical order. Then there are some who will mark their tubs, or their boxes with dates of when they listed items too.Yet another thing that was mentioned was to put a picture with each tub of what is in there also. Many many ways, and this is something for us all to find our way that works for us.

When placing the boxes, or the tubs on the shelves many noted to keep the spacing right between each one so that it was easier to slide the containers out like drawers when they had to be accessed. I did find that some who had large amounts of inventory would use storage units. They would use units that had set access times to them, video surveillance cameras on the property, tall chain link fences, and some have an access code you have to use to get through the gates to the units too. With the units they not only kept their inventory there, but would also have the tables set out with shipping supplies there for them to box, wrap, package too. Interesting, isn't it?

Many did mention having an inventory spreadsheet for their inventory too. Some would map their inventory from organizing, and labeling. Interesting, huh? When you bring more products home it is best to group items together, and then to organize them. 

Organizing our inventory, and having control with it is an everyday task. Can give us a headache too. Hopefully some of the methods mentioned will help you with your thoughts of what will work for you, and organizing your inventory. It is always nice to get some ideas of what others do to help you in organizing what will work for you. 

Good Luck with all your organizing everyone! Thanks for visiting with LilacsNDreams, and I hope your new year is treating you well so far. Take care, and see you again soon!