Storekeeper
For manufacturers

Manufacturing inventory software for inventory management, tracking and stock control

A factory does not have one inventory. It has three: raw materials, work in progress, and finished goods, chained together by a bill of materials. Software that only counts one of them will let a $4 component stop a $40,000 production run.

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The short answer

Manufacturing inventory software tracks stock at every stage of production: the raw materials and components you buy, the work in progress sitting on the floor, and the finished goods you sell. It uses a bill of materials (BOM) to link them, so when you plan 500 finished units it knows exactly which components to reserve and what to reorder. Generic inventory apps track what you sell; manufacturing inventory software also tracks what you consume to make it.

Last updated July 2026.

The core difference

Three inventories, one bill of materials

Each pool fails differently, and a system that watches only finished goods misses two thirds of the risk.

Stock pool What it is How it hurts you when untracked
Raw materials and components Everything you buy to build with, from sheet steel to screws to labels One missing component idles the whole line; the cheapest part causes the most expensive stockout
Work in progress (WIP) Materials already committed to open production orders Cash that looks like inventory but cannot be sold or returned; invisible in a simple stock count
Finished goods Sellable product, in your warehouse or already at channel partners Forecast this pool wrong and you either miss orders or melt cash into dead stock

The bill of materials is what connects them. When demand for a finished SKU changes, the BOM explodes that change down into component requirements. That is the whole trick: forecast once at the top, and purchasing at the bottom follows automatically.

What goes wrong

How manufacturers lose money on inventory

These are the three patterns that send a plant manager looking for manufacturing inventory management software.

The $4 part that stops the line

Component demand is derived demand: it spikes exactly when production is scheduled, not smoothly through the month. A static reorder point set last year does not know your production calendar, so the alert fires after the line is already waiting.

Raw materials bought on fear

After one line-down event, buyers over-order everything. Raw material stock swells, safety stock becomes a guess with a markup, and working capital quietly moves from the bank account to the shelf.

Forecast and purchasing never meet

Sales forecasts finished goods in a spreadsheet. Purchasing orders components from gut feel. Nobody explodes one into the other through the BOM, so the two plans disagree and the floor discovers it first.

The checklist

What manufacturing inventory software must actually do

Ignore the feature grid with 200 rows. These six capabilities decide whether the system pays for itself.

Multi-level BOM support

Sub-assemblies inside assemblies. If your product has a board that goes into a module that goes into a unit, a single-level BOM will lie to you about component demand.

Demand-driven reorder points per component

Computed from forecast production, supplier lead time and variability, and recomputed as those change. A number you typed in once is a countdown to a line stop.

Lot and batch tracking

Which lot of which material went into which production run. If you are in food, cosmetics, supplements or anything recallable, this is not optional.

Purchase orders drafted from the plan

The system should hand your buyer a drafted purchase order with quantities and dates, not a report to interpret into one.

Accounting sync, not accounting replacement

Inventory value and COGS should flow to QuickBooks or your ERP. A tool that asks your accountant to move house rarely gets adopted.

Floor-friendly stock movements

Receiving, issuing to production and finishing goods should be a scan or two taps. Anything slower and the floor stops recording, and the counts rot within a month.

The honest comparison

Manufacturing inventory tools compared

Entry pricing verified on each vendor's own pricing page in July 2026. Prices move; check before you buy.

Tool Entry price Manufacturing depth Best for
Katana $299/mo Core Strong: BOMs, production scheduling, shop floor app Small to mid manufacturers who live in production planning daily
Fishbowl $229/mo Essentials (annual) Mature: work orders, multi-level BOMs; forecasting only on Scale ($729) QuickBooks shops that need manufacturing plus warehousing in one
Cin7 Core $349/mo Standard Good BOM support inside a broad multichannel platform Makers who also sell heavily through retail and marketplaces
Zoho Inventory $29/mo Standard (annual) Light: kitting and bundles rather than real production Very simple assembly on a tight budget
Storekeeper Early access; planned from $49/mo Forecast-first: per-SKU demand forecasts, reorder points, dead-stock flags; BOM support on the roadmap Teams whose real problem is deciding what to reorder, not recording what moved

Storekeeper is in early access, so if you need production orders and BOM explosion shipping this month, Katana or Fishbowl is the honest answer today. If your pain is upstream of that, knowing what to reorder and when, run the scan at the top of this page on your item list and see what a forecast-first system tells you. We compare the whole category in our best inventory management software breakdown and go deeper on Fishbowl in our Fishbowl alternatives guide. If you are weighing a cloud manufacturing platform, our Unleashed alternatives and Megaventory alternatives pages compare the smaller vendors on price and forecasting.

Frequently asked

Manufacturing inventory questions, answered

What is manufacturing inventory management?
Manufacturing inventory management is the tracking and control of stock through all three stages of production: raw materials, work in progress, and finished goods. It differs from retail inventory management because demand for components is derived from the production plan through a bill of materials, not directly from customer sales.
What is the difference between inventory management software and ERP?
Inventory management software does one job: track stock and drive purchasing and production decisions. An ERP tries to run the whole company, including finance, HR and CRM, and typically costs 5 to 20 times more with implementation measured in months. Most small manufacturers get more value from a focused inventory or MRP tool synced to their accounting system than from a full ERP.
How do manufacturers keep track of inventory?
The common progression is spreadsheets, then a generic inventory app, then manufacturing inventory software with BOM support. The systems that work share three habits: every stock movement is recorded at the moment it happens (usually by barcode scan), component demand is calculated from the production plan rather than guessed, and counts are verified continuously with cycle counting instead of one annual shutdown.
What is a bill of materials (BOM)?
A bill of materials is the recipe for a product: the list of every component and quantity needed to build one unit, including sub-assemblies. Inventory software uses it to explode finished-goods demand into component requirements. If you plan 500 units and each takes two brackets, the BOM is what turns that plan into a purchase order for 1,000 brackets.
What software do small manufacturers use for inventory?
Katana and MRPeasy are the most common picks for small manufacturers who need production planning; Fishbowl dominates among QuickBooks users; Cin7 Core suits makers selling through many channels. Small operations with simple assembly often start with Zoho Inventory. The right answer depends on whether your bottleneck is production scheduling, warehousing, or purchasing decisions.
Does Storekeeper support bills of materials today?
Not yet. Storekeeper is in early access and BOM explosion is on the roadmap. What works today is the free stock scan: paste finished goods and components as line items and it computes days of cover, safety stock and reorder verdicts per SKU. If you need multi-level BOMs and work orders shipping now, Katana or Fishbowl is the honest recommendation.

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