Overview of 4 types of warehouse management systems

Standalone warehouse management systems provide features that enable efficient day-to-day warehouse operations. Companies can use these systems to monitor and control supply chain flow from when goods arrive and leave the warehouse, as well as other important functions. Systems vary from vendor to vendor, but these functions may include a variety of inventory and operational features, including the following:

• Receiving
• Put-away
• Replenishment
• Expiration date tracking
• Cycle counting
• Picking
• Slotting
• Packing
• Auditing and shipping
• Expiration date tracking

Standalone WMSes may also offer advanced features such as cross-docking and advanced analytics.

Standalone WMSes typically do not feature broader supply chain functions but do contain important warehouse operations functions, said Sachin Misra, principal at Kalypso, a consulting company in Beachwood, Ohio. These focus on automating tasks around inventory management and warehouse operations so workers don’t have to do manual entry.

Compared with a WMS that’s integrated with a supply chain management system or an ERP system, a standalone WMS system may lack some of those integration benefits, Misra said.

Standalone warehouse management systems work particularly well for smaller companies that don’t necessarily have full-blown manufacturing — for example, a third-party logistics provider, Misra said.

Outdoor gearmaker Sea to Summit North America in Boulder, Colo., the North American headquarters of the Australian company, is one company using a standalone WMS.

“Any company that has experienced an accelerated growth pattern, exponential growth pattern, from a small business to a medium-size business goes through the same growing pains that we went through,” said Shaun Frazier, director of operations for North America.

Leaders at Sea to Summit North America decided the company needed a warehouse management system that would enable it to scale quicker and more efficiently, he said.

“We were primarily on QuickBooks and we had manual picking, packing and shipping processes that involved a really arduous Excel spreadsheet-style pick list, which made things very challenging with inventory management,” Frazier said. “It [didn’t] allow us to really communicate back to our customers in a timely manner or give us a lot of trust in our [inventory] availability.”

The company wanted a system that allowed it to automate those business functions, Frazier said. Sea to Summit ultimately opted for a standalone WMS from PathGuide because it bolted on to its SAP Business One ERP system and the WMS was also very customizable.

“We liked the standalone option because at that time [2015], at least, WMS was not the priority of most ERPs,” he said. “A standalone WMS has many, many other functions and focuses. They can be very dynamic and very customizable.”