Articles that are affected by this are those that have not or hardly been sold over a long period of time. Accordingly, the analysis period you choose should be relatively long. We recommend a period of at least six months, for seasonal products one year or a period corresponding to the season.
To identify individual items as slow-moving items, you should first look at the item lists. If an article appears with low values according to the number of units sold as well as according to sales or gross profit, this is a first strong indication of a slow-moving item.
You can confirm the existing suspicion via the corresponding article ABC analyzes. Are before
Foregone articles classified as C articles, you only have a minimal share of your sales, yours
number of items sold etc.
Such articles should therefore burden your warehouse as little as possible. It is advisable to gradually reduce the inventory by selling it off until there are only a few or no more units in stock. Especially with large items that use up a lot of storage capacity and cause high costs, you should consider purchasing them only on order. Articles that are no longer in stock and have not been ordered for a long time may possibly be removed from your range entirely. This also applies to articles that have been inactive for a long time. Because every article in your range also causes costs through article maintenance, procurement, storage and capital commitment.
The same procedure can be used for categories and manufacturers. If a category or a manufacturer stands out negatively, you should examine the individual articles of this. Individual articles of the identified categories or manufacturers may still be successful.
Whether you should actually remove the identified articles or categories from your shop also depends on your industry. Some items do not sell for a long time, but can then be urgently needed, for example spare parts or special accessories. You should also consider a possible seasonality of the articles.