Inventory in Quickbooks...different question this time.
October 26, 2009 7:19 PM   Subscribe

How to simplify inventory management of jewelry materials and products in QB 2009 Premier Retail?

I'm entirely self taught with QB, and have learned a lot, but I'm trying to simplify my current process of managing my inventory. Here's what I have right now. I manage my raw materials in a separate program that does not "talk" with QB. I use this program when I make an item to track how many beads, clasps, etc I use on each piece, and to determine cost and price. In QB I have an asset account called "raw materials" and one called "finished jewelry". The raw materials account is simply the total value of all the raw materials on hand, it does not track each individual item. Each finished piece is a separate inventory item. When I create a new piece, I add it to my "finished jewelry" asset, then do a quantity adjustment to transfer the cost from "raw materials" to "finished jewelry". All of my pieces are one of a kind, so at some point, I am going to hit the limit of how many items I can have. I would like to set it up so my inventory items are more general.

For example, I have 5 bracelets which all sell for $25 a piece. However, each one has a different cost, depending on what materials were used. Is there a way that I can have one item called "Bracelet25" versus having 5 different items? And how would I go about accounting for transferring the cost out of raw materials for each item both when it is made and when it is sold (for COGS)?
posted by daniboi1977 to Work & Money (2 answers total)
 
I don't think QB is going to do this - I mean, what you're saying is basically "I want to be able to manually set the cost individually on a per-item basis". QB doesn't think two items that have different costs are the same item, period. At least, I don't think it can.

It seems like the system you have in place right now could be done entirely in QB using item assemblies, which would simplify things by at least making it so you didn't have to use a separate program and would take care of accurate costing. But that doesn't help you with the item list limit. Is there a reason you can't delete items that are older than, say, six months? Given that you create a new item for each piece it seems like the overwhelming majority of your items are obsolete, right?
posted by crinklebat at 8:57 PM on October 26, 2009


Response by poster: Is that possible? I didn't think that an item could be deleted if it was used in a transaction? I know I can deactivate it, but that still affects the item count.

Using the other program isn't a problem for me. It allows me to easily have pictures of the items and materials, and print out catalogs, etc. I actually prefer using it to using assemblies in QB.

I actually thought of that...that QB just wouldn't be able to do what I'm wanting it to. I'm thinking I'll probably have to rethink my inventory management approach for next year. I'll talk to my accountant at tax time to see if he has any ideas. I know that the way I have it set up right now works well for him. I just thought I'd see if anyone else out there had any ideas.

Thanks!
posted by daniboi1977 at 4:42 AM on October 27, 2009


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