Inventory tracking

[stickygraphics12]

I just finshed my inventory over the weekend.(my favorite time of the year) and was kind of wondering how some of you keep track of your vinyl rolls throughout the year. What I've always done is unrolled the vinyl and put a mark at every yard and at the end of the year just do the rolls that were purchased throughout the year. It seems like there should be a better way.......maybe I'm wrong, but would love to get some feedback....

 

[Pat Whatley]

Okay, call me crazy but why are you doing year end inventory on supplies?

Just curious, my accountants write everything off as an expense the day it's purchased.

 

[zmatalucci]

my rolls don't last long enough to keep track of them...although versaworks has the linear ft. counter available if you really want to keep all of those jobs in the list,, and then go through and separate which job was which type of vinyl

 

[Mosh]

Don't waste your time, it should be all wrote off. It is not like retail inventory. We have 40-50 different rolls in our shop, no way I am measuring all that.

 

[stickygraphics12]

Well i guess i need to have a talk with my accountant! He told me the past 2 years that I needed to count that b/c it is a resellable item! He also told me i need to count all of my substrate drop pieces b/c i can sell them also......

Mosh - I have about 30 rolls and i just finsihed unrolling them and rolling them back up and putting a mark every yard....dont i feel like a dumb@$$! Wait til 9am tomorrow when i call my accountant!

THANKS though guys.....

 

[Malkin]

I made a strip of thin plastic with marks for every 2 yards. I wrap it around the outside of the roll to measure the diameter. It's usually accurate to within 1 yard or so. I use it for the rolls of colored cast vinyl we keep.

 

[Mosh]

Go ahead and measure. You might as well roll all of your application tape out and measure that. Don't forget masking tape.

Your time wasted, not mine. BTW I have been audited 4 times, nothing was ever brought up about that!

 

[Fred Weiss]

If your accountant has you on an accrual system then you should inventory. If he has you on a cash system then it is written off when you pay for it. We've been on an accrual system for years and each year we divide our vinyl up into similar groups and count each roll by estimating it's fractional remainder. Half a roll of this; three quarters of a roll of that etc. Then add it up and apply an average price by category. Takes about half an hour.

 

[James Burke]

Inventory

I've gone through this many times with my accountant (wife) and I'll second the motion that it's no fun to squabble over the particular ins and outs of "cost of goods sold". She tracks what we buy from the invoices and all I have to do is let her know how much remains at year end.

Since we're on a cash basis, some things are written off at time of purchase, while other things are inventoried...why...I do not know, but that's just one of those things.

It might be easier to keep track (on your job or work order sheet) of what is used each time and then subtract that from the original purchased quantity.

Tax laws vary from state to state, so go easy on your accountant.


Jim

 

[47CP]

We've been on an accrual system for years and each year we divide our vinyl up into similar groups and count each roll by estimating it's fractional remainder. Half a roll of this; three quarters of a roll of that etc. Then add it up and apply an average price by category. Takes about half an hour.

This is what we do and it works fine.

DaveW

 

[Gino]

After enough years of looking at these rolls, you tend to get a knack for estimating and we're usually just about spot on. We don't do it for inventory, but for if there is enough vinyl on the roll for a particular job. Just today the one guy asked my if I thought there was 68' on the roll and I said it looked like about 75'.... half a roll. When we were done, it had 73' on it. Now there's only 5' and we generally throw that stuff into a pile and in spare time cut circles, stripes and other do-jiggy things you need for accents and whatnots on any given job.

 

[Edserv]

We have a really easy system for tracking inventory. First, we have a "Burn Bucket" that our ops team drops every expended disposable item into (such as tubes and inks). Second, as part of our closing duties, our ops team takes the Burn Bucket to accounting department to close out. Third, our accounting department reconciles our Burn Bucket against stored and floor inventory. This works really well, as no one can steal or fudge anything, and our accounting team is on top of inventory. In fact, they know when to order before or when our ops people need stuff. (We also track everything through a custom built database that we use to job cost.) It's really easy once you get everyone on the same page.!
Good luck,
Chris
Lets Go Banners

 

[D2S]

This is pretty accurate.... http://www.cutsmart.com/pages/roll-length.html

 

[WB]

We do inventory every year sometimes every 6 months.. Maybe writing everything off as an exspense works out in the end, but at the end of the year if you still have 10-20k in inventory sitting on your floor I would think you'd want to take that off your year end exspenses and show it as a plus not a negitive

If I'm count rolls of vinyl printable vinyl I just estimate by 1/4-1/2-3/4 rolls
if you talking colured vinyl I just put a sticker inside the roll saying how much vinyl came in.. everytime I use it I subtract what I used from the number.. makes it real easy comer year end instead of rolling everything out.

 

[Diane]

I weight it. Take a short roll of each type, like 2mil 15", 3mil 24", etc. where the weight would be different. Weight it and get your weight per yard. Weigh any empty cores that you have to get that value. Note that there are basically two thicknesses of cores.

Make a chart (I'd copy mine but I can't find it right now) so you only do that once and will have it from year to year when inventory comes up again.

Assuming you have a desktop scale, grab a roll, put it on the scale, get the weight, subtract the weight of the core, then divide by the weight per yard and you have the number of yards on the roll.

We only do inventory once per year, and we only weigh rolls that will have more than 4-5 yards on them. The rest is expensed.

There's a little bit of work up front in setting up your weight chart, but it's still a lot less work than rolling out everything, and it's a bit more accurate than guessing. Although I must say I've pretty much guessed the amount before the weight confirms it.