If it is one thing all my experiences have shown me when working with manufacturers, very few of them have a firm grasp on their actual 'total costs' when it comes to their finished goods. While many rely on their limited accounting systems, like QuickBooks to capture their 'hard costs' of their products, they rarely can tell you how much actual manpower, or specific overhead factors went into production of a single product. They simply hope that they are charging enough for all the products they sell to cover their real costs on any one finished good.
Sooner or later, if they stay in business past the first couple of years, they realize that they need more than what entry-level accounting can provide. Some consultants would have them migrate from their simplified accounting to a full-blown ERP system that incorporates the accounting into the overall software solution. In other words, they are led to believe that they must transition from a few thousand-dollars per year for their software, to tens-of-thousands of dollars per year for a software package.
Absolutely nothing could be further from the truth. There are several excellent manufacturing software solutions that work with small business software, like QuickBooks, to do the work and handle the details that QuickBooks accounting simply cannot do adequately on its own. Over the next few installments of this mini-series we will look at one such solution.
INDUSTRIOS, by INDUSTRIOS Software, Inc. of Ontario, Canada, is one such solution. The INDUSTRIOS Manufacturing Suite offers a variety of modules designed to give discrete manufacturers precisely what they need when it comes to managing the manufacturing process and the costs of manufacturing. But INDUSTRIOS also offers more, it insures that every quote is consistent with actual manufacturing design, process and cost as well as the expected revenues to guarantee profitability. Then INDUSTRIOS guides the production planning, including purchasing and stocking requirements to ensure that every order is staged perfectly in line with promised delivery dates and overall demand.
With INDUSTRIOS you will not only configure and track your 'materials' as part of building finished goods, but you will track the entire 'process' including manpower, resources, location and facility requirements along with labor and overhead. Quality control and assurance are key factors in not only protecting your reputation as a manufacturer but in insuring that defects and return have a non-existent impact upon your production costs.
With INDUSTRIOS you can option for superior analytics and datametrics that will provide you with real-time measures of your production focusing in on those issues that need your attention before they become problems. And because INDUSTRIOS integrates perfectly with QuickBooks your accounting staff won't need to change their practices at all, they will still use the QuickBooks they love for their treasury functions like payments, cash receipts, routine expenditures, payroll and financial statements.
If all of this sounds too good to be true, then you will want to take this little tour with me as we examine many of the key features that make INDUSTRIOS so appealing for those who need more than QuickBooks to meet their manufacturing requirements.
CRM and Sales Functionality
Unlike some manufacturing systems that only take control at the point a manufacturing order is set for production, or require users to make sales within QuickBooks, INDUSTRIOS offers a comprehensive approach to customer relationship management that begins with their CRM functionality.
INDUSTRIOS gives users the tools and information they need to deliver an exceptional customer experience. Whether it’s Sales, Marketing or Customer Support, the INDUSTRIOS CRM feature allows users to optimize the time spent on developing and maintaining successful relationships and maximizing opportunities.
Industrios CRM
Because the CRM is integrated into INDUSTRIOS there is no need for redundant data entry. This feature supports access to all the customer’s data including quotes, orders, production in progress, completed sales, shipping, invoicing, payment and collections. In fact, users even coordinate order Return Material Authorizations (RMAs) along with subsequent repair or refurbishment cycles all within the integrated INDUSTRIOS CRM feature.
The natural extension of the INDUSTRIOS CRM is the ability to produce quotes and sales transactions. Users will find quotation a simpler process because all of a customer's information is stored within the CRM and populates the quote giving users all they need to know with as much detail as they wish to have. Users will easily track quotes within the CRM making follow-up easy-breezy. Once the quote has been accepted by a customer it can be turned into an active sales order and then firmly incorporated into the manufacturing calendar for production by the promised date.
Even though INDUSTRIOS makes it easy to enter sales related items into a quote, the reality is that many manufacturing orders don’t follow the norm, something needs to be tweaked or fine-tuned.
Industrios Sales Order
While some sales may take place from stock, other sales will be based upon changes to an existing specification, and some sales generated for finished products that are made exclusively to the order requirements. In fact, some orders may be made to design requiring engineering from the ground up. That’s why INDUSTRIOS offers a Product Configurator that gives users flexibility in the sale of products within all the available options so that timely quotes can be almost instantly generated to meet the customer’s requirements.
In addition, INDUSTRIOS gives users optional CAD integration that simplifies design and costing of custom or new finished products or intermediary assemblies by supporting easy import of Bills-of-material.
INDUSTRIOS even offers an optional EDI feature allowing users to transmit quotations directly to EDI equipped customers or receive purchase orders directly into the manufacturer’s sales transactions ensuring the accuracy of orders for production.
In a made-to-order environment, a new Sales Order may trigger a new production “job” (which is the term INDUSTRIOS uses to describe the actual manufacturing process) to meet the specific production demand associated with that Sales Order.
Inventory, Purchasing and Material Resource Planning
There are really two different approaches to systems that integrate with QuickBooks when it comes to manufacturing. The first are those 'inventory systems' that profess to offer manufacturing capabilities. The second are those manufacturing systems that incorporate inventory essentials to accomplish the production process.
INDUSTRIOS is an example of the second type of system because manufacturing simply isn’t possible without proper inventory control. Users will take control of inventory from materials planning to stock replenishment to insure they have sufficient inventory on hand to fill not only all present production requirements but anticipated orders as well.
INDUSTRIOS offers enhanced inventory tracking and control allowing users to manage costs and lifecycles of every component. INDUSTRIOS users define the ‘cost’ of all materials, including sub-assemblies in stock, as well as finished products with the cost method that most accurately fits their true cost in terms of how raw materials are purchased, stored, and used.
Industrios Inventory
Serial and lot management functions insure traceability from the time of receipt through their lifecycle including delivery of the finished goods. Barcode organization including labeling capabilities helps to ensure that each component is the right component for every assembly situation.
Purchasing is undoubtedly one of the most tedious and time-consuming processes in the manufacturing environment. INDUSTRIOS streamlines this process by making it easier to know what and when specific materials need to be ordered, and from whom.
Users will not only track your suppliers and have the most current applicable costs based upon historical purchasing data, but they will easily analyze each vendors performance to determine their track record at supplying essential materials on-time and in conformity with your orders.
Users can request quotes, issue specific purchase orders, or use blanket purchasing agreements based upon agreed terms, pricing and delivery frequency all within a set acquisition limit. Imagine being able to take advantage of quantity-based terms, product costs, and discounts on a supplier-by-supplier basis. And users can easily establish preferred suppliers for each component with alternates based upon every suppliers' own ability to meet the manufacturer's requirements.
The INDUSTRIOS material resource planning feature will spot inventory needs based upon the production schedule, sales not yet in production and even projected requirements based upon established criteria.
INDUSTRIOS allows users to maintain inventory integrity with proper receiving matched against each vendor order, then take it to the next level by matching receiving to vendor billing. These checks-and-balances insure that received materials are exactly as ordered, in the quantities needed, and at the agreed pricing.
Users will then put-away received stock in the proper place every time, even if a temporary holding location is appropriate. With configured stock locations defined to the degree needed (location, warehouse, zone, area, row, shelf and bin) users will always know where every item is in stock.
Even better, INDUSTRIOS allows for simplification of stock fulfillment to the required or specified locations in the production environment by incorporating stock requirements into a ‘Process Plan’ that encompasses the materials, resource and routing provisions. Inventory staff will know exactly when and where each stock item should be pulled from inventory and transitioned to the correct manufacturing location to meet production requirements.
And that pretty much takes us to 'production' which we will look at in our upcoming Part 2 of this mini-series. In the meantime, if you want more information about INDUSTRIOS as a potential add-on solution for QuickBooks, then be sure to visit the INDUSTRIOS website.