Wallmart Inventory System
- Submitted by: gogomiro
- Views: 2837
- Category: Politics: Economics
- Date Submitted: 09/06/2010 07:47 PM
- Pages: 4
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Barcode Systems
Barcode inventory control systems have become the standard in the United States. Barcodes are relatively inexpensive and have a couple of advantages over traditional manual-entry systems.
Accuracy. Once the barcode is printed with the correct information, there is very little room for error. With manual-entry inventory systems the clerk may enter $9.69 instead of $9.96; this simply doesn’t happen with barcodes.
Speed. Even though some people are amazingly fast at the 10 key or at typing, there is no feasible way to be as fast as scanning it. Think about how much faster the grocery store process is with scanners. Imagine if the grocery store clerks had to enter everything in by hand; you would be in line for a lot longer.
The one disadvantage of this type of inventory control system over manual-entry is that for most companies it will cost more in terms of pure dollars paid. It costs money to buy barcode printers, scanners, and stickers. In addition it costs money to buy the software to manage it all. With hand entry all you need is a spreadsheet
After extensive last minute digging, I finally found a manager who trusted me enough to supply me with the name of the inventory system that is used. Unfortunately for me this is all I could uncover from my employer, but it is a start. Wal-Mart uses the SMART system. Because of the way it is spelled I can only assume that it is an acronym. I have been searching for over an hour on Google.com and finally produced some meager results, but here they are.
Background
From the results produced, I am at the deduction that SMART is not an acronym after all. SMART is basically a tracking system, it keeps track of inventory, the on-hand counts, and can automatically reorder product that is low or empty. Most interaction with the SMART system is through the Telxon. Just to recap, the Telxon is a 900 MHz wireless handheld terminal equipped with a barcode scanner. When a barcode is scanned, almost instantly...
Barcode inventory control systems have become the standard in the United States. Barcodes are relatively inexpensive and have a couple of advantages over traditional manual-entry systems.
Accuracy. Once the barcode is printed with the correct information, there is very little room for error. With manual-entry inventory systems the clerk may enter $9.69 instead of $9.96; this simply doesn’t happen with barcodes.
Speed. Even though some people are amazingly fast at the 10 key or at typing, there is no feasible way to be as fast as scanning it. Think about how much faster the grocery store process is with scanners. Imagine if the grocery store clerks had to enter everything in by hand; you would be in line for a lot longer.
The one disadvantage of this type of inventory control system over manual-entry is that for most companies it will cost more in terms of pure dollars paid. It costs money to buy barcode printers, scanners, and stickers. In addition it costs money to buy the software to manage it all. With hand entry all you need is a spreadsheet
After extensive last minute digging, I finally found a manager who trusted me enough to supply me with the name of the inventory system that is used. Unfortunately for me this is all I could uncover from my employer, but it is a start. Wal-Mart uses the SMART system. Because of the way it is spelled I can only assume that it is an acronym. I have been searching for over an hour on Google.com and finally produced some meager results, but here they are.
Background
From the results produced, I am at the deduction that SMART is not an acronym after all. SMART is basically a tracking system, it keeps track of inventory, the on-hand counts, and can automatically reorder product that is low or empty. Most interaction with the SMART system is through the Telxon. Just to recap, the Telxon is a 900 MHz wireless handheld terminal equipped with a barcode scanner. When a barcode is scanned, almost instantly...