NetSuite Advanced Inventory

This guide explains the demand-planning-related inventory management preferences available in NetSuite.

One of our clients came to us having discovered a large amount of inventory with a value of $0 in NetSuite. Here's how we fixed it.

Every stockout costs you sales. Every overstock ties up cash. With inventory distortion estimated by IHL Group at $1.8 trillion in 2023, getting stock management right isn't just operational—it's existential. NetSuite Inventory Management offers a cloud-based solution that transforms how businesses track, manage, and optimize their inventory across every sales channel and warehouse location. If you're evaluating NetSuite ERP services to drive real business growth, understanding inventory management capabilities should be at the top of your list.

A NetSuite user might make a mistake in their inventory management process and not know how to correct it. Here are a few things to watch for when solving such a problem.

Your customer service team wastes 45 minutes daily calling warehouses to verify stock levels. Your purchasing manager discovers excess inventory accumulating at one location while another faces stockouts. Your e-commerce platform displays items "in stock" that actually require expensive 3-day cross-country shipments. These operational inefficiencies disappear once NetSuite’s inventory automation provides real-time visibility across your entire distribution network—and activation typically takes just 2–4 hours—not months.

This form in NetSuite lists the low-inventory items stocked near their replenishment point and suggests replenishment quantities.

Your supply chain doesn't need to run on spreadsheets and gut instinct anymore. With integrated SCM systems reducing inventory carrying costs and significantly decreasing stockouts compared to manual tracking, properly configured NetSuite ERP transforms guesswork into data-driven operations—turning your inventory and purchasing chaos into automated efficiency.

Every inventory transaction affects your bottom line, yet many businesses struggle to track costs accurately across fluctuating purchase prices and multiple warehouse locations. NetSuite's average cost method—the platform's default inventory costing approach—automatically calculates a weighted average cost whenever you receive or adjust inventory. When implemented correctly, this method eliminates manual cost tracking headaches and delivers accurate COGS (Cost of Goods Sold) on every transaction.

Your planning team just spent 35 hours building next month's inventory forecast in Excel. The spreadsheet is already outdated, and you're still flying blind on what to order and when. With integrated demand planning systems helping businesses dramatically improve forecast accuracy and reduce carrying costs, NetSuite's Demand Planning module transforms months of manual calculations into automated, data-driven inventory decisions that protect your bottom line.

Your manufacturing operation is bleeding efficiency through manual production tracking and inventory guesswork. While many manufacturing ERP implementations fail to deliver expected ROI due to improper configuration, businesses that properly enable NetSuite's core manufacturing features achieve improved inventory accuracy, fewer production delays, and faster month-end close.