Inventory Management Excel: Pros, Cons and Tips

Many people have a love-hate relationship with Excel, Microsoft’s powerful spreadsheet software.

Despite this, no one can deny its capabilities as a staple in almost every industry, especially mid-sized eCommerce companies looking for a quick way to track inventory.

Mid-sized companies often find themselves in a challenging spot. They’re too big for manual inventory tracking but not ready for full-fledged inventory management software.

Microsoft Excel serves as an ideal bridge between these options.

Implement the strategies in this post and watch your inventory management excel (see what we did there) to new heights.

Let’s dive in.

How to do inventory management in Excel

The beauty of Excel is its flexibility. You can make your inventory tracking as simple or complex as you need.

You can start with something as rudimentary as item quantities or build a massive, multi-spreadsheet system with automated calculations, detailed product specifications, supply chain tracking, sales analytics, and predictive reorder points.

You can also use Excel’s computational abilities to track critical metrics like quantity in stock, purchase costs, inventory value, and quantity in reorder.

That said, building from scratch will take a lot of work. That’s why we recommend using inventory management templates to start (especially if you’re not Excel-savvy).

Creating (or borrowing) an inventory management spreadsheet

If you’re ready to take Excel for a spin as your inventory management tool, the next step involves finding the right spreadsheet for you.

The good news is you have options. Whether you want to build your own from scratch or find a perfect template, the solutions you need are out there.

Here are a few options:

Build your own spreadsheet

Building your sheet from scratch is a viable option if you’re already a spreadsheet wizard. The prospect of building it yourself may even sound fun to you (no judgment, we promise).

By taking this approach, you’ll…