The 6 Essential Categories of Manufacturing Inventory
Manufacturing inventory encompasses far more than finished products stored in warehouses:
- Raw Materials (RM): Base metals, plastic polymers, chemical pigments, and standard hardware awaiting production issue.
- Work-in-Progress (WIP): Unfinished assemblies, stampings, and cut blanks currently progressing through shop-floor routings.
- Finished Goods (FG): Completed, quality-inspected products packaged and staged for customer dispatch.
- Consumables: Coolants, lubricants, welding electrodes, grinding discs, and tooling inserts.
- Spare Parts & Maintenance (MRO): Critical motor belts, bearings, hydraulic seals, and spare sensors.
- Packing Materials: Corrugated boxes, pallet wrap, bubble cushioning, and barcode shipping labels.
Proven Inventory Control Methodologies
Core Control Techniques
Leading manufacturers combine FIFO (First In, First Out) for strict age control, ABC Classification (allocating tightest audit rigor to high-value Class A items), Automated Reorder Levels, and Perpetual Cycle Counting to keep book inventory synchronized with physical bin counts within ±0.2% variance.
Production & Plant Control
Manage Operations with ERPrath ERP
Eliminate Excel spreadsheets and uncoordinated shop-floor registers. Connect your Bills of Materials, work orders, inventory, and GST compliance onto one unified German-engineered platform.