Replenishment recommendations is a feature that is currently available to only Reserve storage users. It is an inventory management method in which inventory will be moved from a Reserve Storage location to fulfilment warehouses only when required. This would help you to reduce out of stock scenarios and inventory holding costs.
Prerequisites:
- Must have inventory in reserve storage sites
- Must be sending inventory to Flexport ecommerce fulfillment centers
- The SKU has been in ecommerce fulfillment warehouses previously
- Is not sending to FBA or wholesale fulfillment
When recommendations are turned on, Flexport systems will continuously monitor your inventory across all regions, and when a SKU has low levels of inventory in any region, the system would automatically send a suggestion to replenish the inventory from reserve storage to e-commerce fulfilment warehouses. The minimum amount available for transfer is one case pack per region.
Steps:
- A draft transfer with recommended products and quantities will be created in Flexport portal
- An email will be sent with detailed information about what SKUs need to be replenished
- Click the link to a draft transfer with all recommended SKUs. This will be under Transfer Order Id
- Review the transfer. Edit or cancel the transfer if applicable.
- Confirm the transfer or set up automatic confirmation for recommended transfers
Example
Let us take example of below SKU: DSKUA
Now although the inventory is 100 and demand is 15, we still ask to replenish 204 units is because
- It’s possible all or most of the inventory is in Texas region (which is not included in regions to replenish column), hence we ask to replenish other regions as the inventory might be low in them
- Currently we only replenish in multiples of case pack, so if the recommended quantity is 10 or 20 to replenish but if the case pack size is 500 units per case pack then we will suggest replenishing 500 units which is 1 case pack.
- The minimum amount we replenish is one case pack per region.
Auto Confirm Transfers
If you find the recommendations suggested by the system for replenishment useful, you can choose to enable auto confirm for your transfers. This means that you will not need to manually confirm the transfers each time and instead our systems will automatically confirm and initiate these transfers. You will however still receive email with details of the transfer and review the confirmed transfer in Flexport portal.
Step to enable auto-confirm
- Visit Settings->Inventory page on Flexport portal
- Check on "Confirm recommended transfers automatically"
- Click on "Save Changes"
Set up the Recommendation Strategy
Visit Settings->Inventory page on Flexport portal
Select "Dynamic Strategy" if you want Flexport to select optimal strategy (i.e., Flexport will decide to use either of High, Standard and Lean coverage while computing recommendation) based on your inventory levels and order history.
Select your preferred strategy as per your requirement:
- High coverage (If there is less than 8 weeks of inventory left, replenish with 4 weeks of inventory. Recommended if your inventory demand variablity is high.)
- Standard coverage (If there is less than 5 weeks of inventory left, replenish with 3 weeks of inventory.)
- Lean coverage (If there is less than 3 weeks of inventory left, replenish with 2 weeks of inventory.)
Turn off replenishment recommendations
You can choose to opt out of recommendations that you receive and the automtic creation of draft transfers.
- Visit Settings->Inventory page on Flexport portal
- Toggle off "Recommend transfers from Replenishment into Flexport's Ecom Fulfillment Network"
- Click on "Save Changes"