Implementing modern inventory management software benefits virtually every sort and sector of business. After all, the best inventory apps allow companies of all types and sizes to streamline inventory-related tasks such as counting in-stock inventory, conducting asset audits, and checking inventory in and out as it’s moved, consumed, or sold.
Interior design professionals, in particular, stand to benefit greatly from utilizing inventory management software. This is partly because interior designers operate highly visual businesses, and inventory management software like Sortly is a great fit, offering easy photo-based inventory tracking.
In this article, we’ll discuss the top four ways Sortly’s interior design customers use the Sortly app to track inventory.
1. To maintain a genuinely visual inventory
While every business can benefit from adding high-resolution images of its inventory to a digital database, such a feature isn’t a nice-to-have for interior designers but a must-have. Visually cataloging and tracking inventory—from granite tiles and paint to furniture and one-of-a-kind antiques—allows interior designers to not just record what’s in stock, but to visualize it.
Sortly’s interior designer customers have added more than 876,000 photos to Sortly. Many customers add multiple photos to a single item.
2. To create a flexible inventory system
Sortly’s visual inventory functionality becomes even more meaningful when inventory and assets are organized using a flexible system of customizable tags, categories, and folders.
While all types of Sortly customers fine-tune how their inventory is organized to match the realities of their day-to-day operations, this flexibility is particularly popular for designers and home stagers.
Of course, how such a system is customized depends entirely on company needs. Consider a boutique interior design firm. They could easily customize their inventory system by using folders to track inventory by location, like their on-site storage and various project sites. Or, they could use folders to track inventory by order status, showing what has been ordered and received.
A larger corporate operation might use a hierarchy of folders, categories, and tags to differentiate between items even faster. For example, folders can be used to denote regions, branches, and storage areas managed by different locales. Categories and tags can be used to record all sorts of filterable details, such as an item’s color and style.
Sortly interior designer customers use an average of 166 folders and subfolders to track an average of 1,285 items each.
3. To keep track of items as they arrive, move, or sell
Barcode and QR code scanning allows Sortly customers to update inventory databases rapidly, move items from one location to another, or learn more about a given product quickly. After all, Sortly turns smartphones and tablets into barcode and QR code scanners using only the Sortly app and the device’s camera.
Sortly also allows users to generate custom barcodes and QR codes and print them out on label paper, enabling designers and homestagers to “asset tag” their inventory—from antique secretary desks to lava lamps to lounge chairs.
Additionally, barcode and QR code scanning virtually eliminate many risks of human error during inventory counts, especially when item names are unclear or many items look alike but are not quite the same.
Sortly interior designer customers use an average of 220 barcodes and QR codes. By scanning these items in real time, designers and home stagers practice “perpetual inventory”—an inventory strategy that allows businesses to know exactly what they have on hand, twenty-four hours a day.
Practicing perpetual inventory is key to good inventory control, in which profits are kept high by keeping inventory stock high enough to meet customer demand without wasting cash or other resources.
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4. To generate meaningful reports for both internal and external use
One of Sortly’s most popular features for interior designers is customized reporting. Because Sortly functions as a digital inventory database filled with high-resolution images and key item details, it can rapidly generate powerful reports fine-tuned for various uses. Such reports can also be used to track the items and materials used on a project so you can accurately invoice the customer.
Or, make use of those customized tags mentioned in the previous section. These tags can be filtered to generate all sorts of internal reports for everything from accounting to moodboarding—or leveraged to create client-ready, image-boasting PDFs. Or, for example, a designer could use labels and tags to generate a list of items related to a client project or keep track of items that have been delivered to the client site.
About Sortly
Sortly is an inventory management solution that helps businesses track, manage, and organize their inventory from any device, in any location. Our easy-to-use inventory software is perfect for interior design businesses of all sizes, regardless of the type of inventory they track. Sortly seamlessly integrates inventory tracking into your daily workflow, allowing you to save time and money, satisfy your customers, and ensure the success of your interior design projects.
With Sortly, you can track interior design inventory, assets, and supplies. It comes equipped with smart features like barcoding and QR coding, inventory photos, low stock alerts, customizable folders, data-rich reporting, and much more. Best of all, you can update inventory directly from your smartphone, whether you’re antique shopping, in the storage warehouse, or at a client meeting.
Whether you’re just getting started with inventory management or you’re an expert looking for a more efficient solution, we can transform how your company manages inventory—so you can focus on building your business. That’s why over 15,000 businesses globally trust us as their inventory management solution.
Start your two-week free trial of Sortly today.
