Should every asset have a SKU?
I’ve been working on my Wiki today. I added a long overdue table for shipping. I’ve displayed it here vertically for ease of reading, along with my first entry.
| Order # | 100 |
|---|---|
| SKU | ?? |
| Name | LG900N Laser cutter |
| Qty | 1 |
| Supplier | G Weike |
| Shipper | |
| Tracking # | |
| Order cost | $**** USD |
| Import cost | |
| Total cost | |
| Order date | 2012-05-25 |
| Arrival date | |
| Delivery time |
This way I hope to be able to predict future order times better and avoid “stock outs” or product shortages. I only have one order at the moment, so on a whim I put it into the list. …and then it got me thinking, which is always dangerous. The field for SKU makes me wonder if I should give the laser cutter a SKU. More generally, should *every* asset have a SKU? Here are the pros and cons I see.
Pros
Total asset management: every item in the shop can be tracked, along with it’s depreciation, original cost, cost over time. Items could be easily re-ordered or sold (example: 3D printers). They could be marked for anti-theft purposes and given a QR code for easy how-to lookup, simplifying future employee training. Adding each item would only have to be done once.
Cons
It’s resource consuming to file every item and resources (especially time) are very precious. Some items are labelled individually, some are labelled by type – does this cause a filing headache? How can filing info become invalid or out of date?
I don’t know a lot of highly organized and/or highly effective people – they’re off getting stuff done, I suppose. I’d love to compare notes. Have you got any thoughts, pro or con, to share?
As I look at this I realize the table is a bit misleading – a single order might have multiple items of different type, each with it’s own SKU, in a many-to-one relationship. Dividing up the import costs could be trouble!
