What's With all the Out-of-stocks?

S

Setec Astronomy

Well-known member
I've noticed that there seems to be a lot of out-of-stock situations at certain vendors and/or of certain product lines. First there was some of the Meg's DA MF pads and the 5" backing plate. Then the Detailer bulk QID, now a lot of the GTechniq stuff. I notice ADS is also out of stock on a lot of different items, including OPC.

I can imagine some unforseen demand issues with some of these products, but the length of outage really makes me wonder, like with the Meg's QID...how long does it take to mix up some more and truck it out to the 4 corners of the country? A couple weeks?

With some of the smaller places, like PakShak (GTechniq) and ADS, I can see where it's a cash flow issue, where they don't want to inventory large amounts (especially the GTech which is expensive), or maybe it's a warehouse space issue, but it seems like when the stock runs out it should be replenished a little faster.

Has anybody else noticed this? I bought a few things a month or so ago and candidly, both AG and ADS missed my business because they were missing one thing that I wanted to order, and I didn't want to place multiple orders. Here it a month later and ADS still doesn't have the spray bottle of OPC in stock. What gives?
 
In some cases it may be a matter of the manufacturer not being able to keep up with the demand.

If it is a common item sold by numerous retailers and one retailer is out, they may have forgot to order, didn't order enough or don't have the cash flow to do so.
 
jammerz101 said:
In some cases it may be a matter of the manufacturer not being able to keep up with the demand.
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Ok, I can buy that for something like the DA MF pads, which may have a complicated mfg. process, but for the QID? Which they have been making by the jillion-bottleful for every Wal-Mart, Target, Pep Boys, etc? They can't make enough to fill some one gallon bottles of it so that every distributor is out of it?
 
Or, smart business planning.

I'd rather ship from back-orders than pay up front for inventory, especially in this sluggish economy.

Even big business should be careful with their inventory. Just ask Government Motors.
 
Mr. Gloss said:
Or, smart business planning.

I'd rather ship from back-orders than pay up front for inventory, especially in this sluggish economy.

Even big business should be careful with their inventory. Just ask Government Motors.
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In the electronics industry that I work in, its called JIT (just in time) manufacturing. It requires a lot of hands on electronic monitoring of inventory, to insure that you have the inventory available to ship. For a company the size of AG I would guess that its a inventory monitor issue. There are so many variables that go into understand this, to come up short on an item is not uncommon for even the best of companies.
 
I see it probably being a positive thing. Sounds to me that it could be smart inventory monitoring and/or a sign of a healthy economy.
 
AWhen I took the "factory tour" during Detail Fest, he said his suppliers were not over producing so when they wanted new stock it could take quite a long time to resupply. I am sure Max cannot over buy either since carrying cost on inventory can be expensive. No one wants to sit on unsold inventory. To increase production, you need to pay overtime or hire more staff so the net is profit loss since the price is not increasing. It is business.
 
Mr. Gloss said:
Or, smart business planning. I'd rather ship from back-orders than pay up front for inventory, especially in this sluggish economy.
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Beemerboy said:
In the electronics industry that I work in, its called JIT (just in time) manufacturing.
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Bill D said:
I see it probably being a positive thing. Sounds to me that it could be smart inventory monitoring and/or a sign of a healthy economy.
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Bunky said:
I am sure Max cannot over buy either since carrying cost on inventory can be expensive. No one wants to sit on unsold inventory. To increase production, you need to pay overtime or hire more staff so the net is profit loss since the price is not increasing. It is business.
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Man, you guys have been drinking the bean-counter Kool-Aid! Smart inventory management or just-in-time is supposed to mean you have the right amount of inventory; if you run out, it's no longer just-in-time, it's too late!

Yeah, no one wants to sit on unsold inventory, but as far as preferring to ship from back orders rather than paying up front for inventory, that's fine, as long as another distrubutor wasn't using just-in-time, or my personal favorite inventory control method, the Setec Have-It-On-The-Shelf method, and your customer went there instead, or if you're Meg's and you have no QID, losing the sale because all your distributors were out and your customers had to buy 1Z cockpit gummi-bear or whatever that stuff is...

So since we're buzzword-heavy here, my guess is the little guys aren't keeping their shelves full because they don't have the cash flow because the economy sucks, why Meg's can't keep the supply chain full of QID I really can't fathom, unless all the QID is going to stock the spring supply of the consumer products at the chain stores.
 
I was thinking it was because things were starting to look up, and the cash flow was a little behind the nice pick up in things moving off the shelf. Pure speculation there though.

Setec, if you want Meg's stuff, have you tried your local guy and can you try to get the other stuff you want directly from the manufacturer?
 
Setec Astronomy said:
Man, you guys have been drinking the bean-counter Kool-Aid! Smart inventory management or just-in-time is supposed to mean you have the right amount of inventory; if you run out, it's no longer just-in-time, it's too late!
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Sorry Setec. I am not drinking Kool-Aid. I repeated what max said to refer the instance in question but also know first hand in the company I work for as well. Any company would love to have everything in stock but when you carry many many sku's (stock keeping units) dealing with suppliers who have similar issues some cannot fully appreciate the economic environment.

It is business today and it is not purdy.
 
Bill D said:
I was thinking it was because things were starting to look up, and the cash flow was a little behind the nice pick up in things moving off the shelf. Pure speculation there though.

Setec, if you want Meg's stuff, have you tried your local guy and can you try to get the other stuff you want directly from the manufacturer?
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I'm not looking for QID right now, I'm just a little perplexed at how many things seem to be out of stock at various places.

Bunky said:
Sorry Setec. I am not drinking Kool-Aid. I repeated what max said to refer the instance in question but also know first hand in the company I work for as well. Any company would love to have everything in stock but when you carry many many sku's (stock keeping units) dealing with suppliers who have similar issues some cannot fully appreciate the economic environment.

It is business today and it is not purdy.
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You know, once upon a time, it was a sign of corporate strength to have inventory, you wanted to be able to make the sale. I used to know a car dealer, that if you went to the parts counter and they didn't have the part you wanted in stock, it got logged on a "Lost Sale" clipboard so the parts dept. manager could evaluate it and decide if he should be stocking that part.

I don't know why when I wanted to order my spring "flavor-of-the-year" package AG was out of the 5" MF DA cutting pads, while DI and ADS had them, but ADS didn't have the spray bottle of OPC (which AG had), so I wound up at DI (and got my CC stolen...I hope that was just a coincidence). By the way, it wasn't like these items were out of stock at these vendors for a day or two, I waited weeks for the stock to come back up. However, you guys have hit a nerve on this "inventory management" topic.

Everybody in business has been on this lean/JIT/etc. binge for a long time and I have to call BS--this is just an MBA/bean-counter/Wall St. method to make the bottom line look fatter so people can justify their salaries and bonuses while in fact they are using practices that only benefit THEM and not the company. How anybody can justify losing a sale by saying "but luckily we didn't have any inventory-carrying costs" is not going to be in business very long. That's kind of like a mobile detailer saying "well, I didn't detail any cars today but at least I didn't have to drive anwhere", you didn't spend any money, but you didn't make any either.

/rant
 
Setec Astronomy said:
so I wound up at DI (and got my CC stolen...I hope that was just a coincidence).
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Yikes, now you got me frightened. Down here there have been issues with CCs stolen at gas pumps but now through DI? I guess I'm glad I held off ordereing from them yet.


I'm really not sure how closely the detailing products industry, especially the boutique products sector, may mimic the artificially inflated bottom line tactic. This is a niche business. I wonder how the pipeline from lab to shelf works in this industry. I doubt it 's as elaborate as those of the everyday things you buy in Wal Mart. Maybe products just aren't manufactured in sufficient quantity for the spring season yet and the staple products are probably given the top priority. Shame on them for that, yes, but maybe they're just in the process of picking up the ball. They continue to stay in business though, even the local guys I've noticed.
 
Bill D said:
Yikes, now you got me frightened. Down here there have been issues with CCs stolen at gas pumps but now through DI? I guess I'm glad I held off ordereing from them yet.
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I don't want to start anything, and I haven't gotten my bill yet, but my card was suspended and the CC Co. terminated it when they read off some bogus charges (that they caught, I don't know how). When I see my bill I'll scrutinize it for any other "new" places I used it...which of course doesn't mean my CC wasn't stolen a year ago in one of those server breakins where they stole 12 million card numbers and they just got around to mine now. I've never had this happen before and I don't know what happened and the CC co. was no help. How do they steal them at the gas pumps?
 
They place skimmers where you swipe your card and come back for them later. Makes me all paranoid, tugging and pulling at the card swiper before I use it to make sure it doesn't come off in my hand, then I know it was rigged by a crook. My CC had a strange charge on it a few months ago, so I've been very alert lately.
 
I think most of the online stuff goes straight to the bank and the vendor really has no chance to even see the number. Since you mention gas stations, and since we still are the only state that doesn't have self-serve, we have to give the CC to the gas station attendant. A couple days before the CC co. shut down my card, I tried to buy gas and the attendant came back and said the card was no good...I figured the mag strip was just wearing out and he had a dirty reader...but maybe that's when it got swiped...hmm...
 
I had a credit card number stolen earlier this year and the credit card company caught it pretty quickly (within a few days) so they immediately closed it and opened a new account. They asked if a purchase to a company called Autogeek was legitimate. The last use was at a dry cleaner and they swipe the card on those little readers/printers.
 
Although I cannot speak on behalf of any other companies, I do know that, with the volume during peak season, we (PBMA) put pressure on manufactures and in some cases the demand exceeds the available supply.

For example, we are currently bringing in 10-20 pallets of Meguiars per week. On a typical day have 20 pallets of new merchandise coming in and 20 pallets of orders going out.

If there is an item the manufacturer is behind on or having trouble producing, with our volume we would feel the effects of depleted inventory of that first while a company with a lower turnover rate might still be in stock. Certainly don't want to come off as being boastful, but that is just a fact that influences available inventory.

We work with manufacturers to better forecast in an effort to minimize or avoid back order situations completely but of course it is up to them to ensure that all products are available all the time.

For the brands that are manufactured by PBMA, Max is better able to control this and keep them in stock. Need 100? Produce 300 and stay ahead.

At PBMA our goal is to have every product in stock, in sufficient quantity, at all times.
 
Dwayne said:
For the brands that are manufactured by PBMA, Max is better able to control this and keep them in stock. Need 100? Produce 300 and stay ahead.

At PBMA our goal is to have every product in stock, in sufficient quantity, at all times.
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Thanks, Dwayne. I was beginning to think I was crazy.
 
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