TABLE OF CONTENTS

Retail locations are a common part of businesses and often need to work hand in hand with a warehouse to replenish storefront inventory and track products moving between locations. For WarehouseOS, there are a few different integration options listed below that can assist with handling operations of inventory transferring and tracking between stores and warehouses. Something to consider when deciding which options to utilize, a decision will need to be made to track inventory for the retail location only in the host system, or tracking inventory in the host system and WOS, using an area configuration. Most of these integration solutions can be paired and used together, depending on the circumstance and need.

 

The Store Transfer and Ad Hoc Transfer options listed below are geared more toward only tracking retail inventory in the host system. These options help streamline the inventory transferring process, keeping inventory accurate in WOS as well as both the ecommerce and retail locations in the host system; but also allow the host system to handle the inventory through its point of sale system. In WOS, retail areas are only allowed a single location to store all inventory, so the benefit of individual location tracking is lost in a storefront environment.

 

Some customers prefer to house and track all inventory inside of WOS, the Area Move and Point of Sale adjustments are designed to help with that scenario. They will allow inventory to be tracked for the retail space but kept separate from the warehouse inventory. Areas can be set up and utilized to transfer inventory between locations in the host system, as well as decrementing inventory for point of sale orders.

 

Store Transfer Custom Page

This is a custom page linked under reports that allows inventory to be selected and transferred from the warehouse to the retail space, and vice versa, within WOS. It creates orders in WOS to be picked, getting the benefit of a pick list. It also can be utilized to adjust inventory levels between the ecommerce and retail location in the host system.

The benefit of this option is to be able to streamline the process of transferring inventory from the warehouse to the store, allowing the store employees placing orders from the warehouse to see what is in stock and available to be ordered, creating orders to pick against in WOS, and automatically adjusting the inventory to reflect these inventory decisions. Tracking inventory for the retail locations in WOS can be viewed as a redundancy since we only allow it to be stored in one location, which is the same view as the host system. This solution offers easy communication and movement between the two locations without requiring the retail inventory to be tracked in WOS.

 

Process from Warehouse to Retail location:

  1. Select Store Replenish report link for retail location. If multiple retail locations are needed, each will have a transfer page specific to their location.
  2. Verify retail location under Create Order section of the page.
  3. All existing inventory in WOS is loaded to the page under the Available Inventory section, (this may take several seconds to load all the data).
  4. Use the Search field or scroll to find items to set a Requested Quantity. As items are selected, they will display as lines under the Create Order section of the page.
  5. Review the items and quantities under the Create Order section and make any adjustments needed. 
  6. Add any order notes.
  7. Select Submit Transfer Request.
  8. An order in WOS is created to be picked.
  9. Inventory is decremented from the warehouse/ecommerce location in the host system.
  10. Pick and pack the order in WOS.
  11. Once the items have been received at the retail location, there are two options in the integration setup: 
    1. Inventory can be manually added to the retail location in the host system by the store employees.
    2. To involve WOS in making the inventory adjustments for the retail location, find the transfer order under Open Orders and select Receive Order. Inventory quantities will be pushed up to the retail location in the host system.

Process from Retail location to Warehouse: 

This would follow the same steps as above with the below exceptions.

  1. Available inventory from the host system retail location would display rather than WOS inventory.
  2. Submitting the Transfer Request would create a purchase order in WOS to be receipted against.
  3. Adjustments could be pushed to the host system from the Putaway step or from using the Receive Order button.

 

Track Store Inventory using Areas in WOS

If inventory in a retail space is needing to be tracked inside of WOS, areas can be setup to separate the warehouse and store inventory. Managing this inventory can be done through a few different ways, each example listed below. The components of tracking inventory for a retail space usually consists of two main elements: transferring inventory between areas, in WOS and the host system; and adjusting the inventory to reflect point of sale orders.
 

Setup: To use automated inventory adjustment flows, the retail area in WOS must only contain one location to house all the inventory for the retail space, and the area name in WOS must match the retail location in the host system.

 

Tracking Inventory Movements

 

Option 1: Area Moves for Transfers

When inventory is moved from one area to another in WOS, an adjustment will be made in the host system to decrement the inventory from the location matching the original area and add the inventory to the location matching the new area. 

 

Process: 

  1. Move inventory on the iPad from the warehouse area to the retail area.
  2. Inventory is decremented from the ecommerce location in host system.
  3. Inventory is added to the retail location in the host system.
    1. This can be optional, if preferred to have the store employees manually adding inventory, or some other method for tracking these items in the retail space.
  4. Inventory is physically transported to the retail location.

 

Option 2: Area Moves for Transfers with Staging
When moving inventory from the warehouse to the retail location, or vice versa, an In Transit area can be utilized for additional visibility to show items that have left the warehouse but have not yet made it to the retail store.

 

Process:

  1. Move inventory on the iPad from the warehouse area to the in-transit area.
  2. Inventory is decremented from the ecommerce location in host system.
  3. Inventory is physically transported to the retail location.
  4. Use the Location Move function to move all inventory items from the transfer location to the retail location.
  5. Inventory is added to the retail location in the host system.
    1. This can be optional, if preferred to have the store employees manually adding inventory, or some other method for tracking these items in the retail space.

 

Point of Sale Inventory Adjustments

When Point of Sale orders are placed against the retail location in the host system, that inventory should be decremented from the retail location in WOS. Automated Inventory Pulls must specify a location. A POS order won't be able to specify specific locations within the Retail Area. Because of this, only one location is allowed in the retail area in WOS to make this automated adjustment possible.

 

Option 1: Scheduled Query for Point of Sale Orders

An integration flow can be set to check the host system for new point of sale orders on a schedule, checking every 10-15 minutes. When point of sale orders are found, inventory is decremented according to the order lines found.

 

Option 2: Setup a Webhook for Point of Sale Orders

Setup a webhook to get orders out of the host system. Point of Sale orders will be filtered out and inventory decremented respective to order lines found. This option is known to be a little faulty with no real check other than to run a check for these orders on a schedule, which is essentially the first option listed.