Inventory Management in Small and Medium-Sized Manufacturing Companies and Its Main Dilemmas

Denisa Ferenčíková

Department of Industrial Engineering and Information Systems Tomas Bata University in Zlín, Faculty of Management and Economics Zlín, 760 01, Czech Republic

IM 30

Abstract 

This paper briefly reviews some recent work aimed at inventory management and its problems and dilemmas in today´s competitive world.

The study is focused especially on small and medium-sized manufacturing companies with very complex production processes.

The main goal is to outline the major difficulties influencing the performance of small and medium-sized manufacturing companies in connection with the complexity of their production processes.

Some examples from the Czech business environment and results from the previous researches of the author are briefly analyzed and discussed in several parts of the essay.

The final part includes a short case study describing the implementation of several small improvements that should positively influence the inventory management and gain some saving for the company.  

Keywords: Inventory management, production complexity, production process performance, stock level