Java Books The Need for Electronic Bookkeeping in Competitive Small Businesses: The JavaBooks Case Study

Small independent book retailers are facing a variety of issues that they must meet in a very proactive and direct manner if they are to be truly competitive and viable businesses over the long-term. In addition to finding ways in which to attract and retain customers, small retailers in all industries must find ways to improve efficiency and rescue costs as much as possible, so they can come closer to the prices offered by larger retailers that can operate on lower margins due to their higher volumes. Establishing the proper systems and adopting the necessary technology to achieve this efficiency can require some significant investments of time and energy, but the rewards of this investment are quite substantial.

This is a lesson that Margaret Smith ahs clearly not taken to heart, and her bookstore, JavaBooks, is facing a nightmare of inefficiency and inaccurate bookkeeping. There is no comprehensive or accurate catalog of the titles that the store carries, product ordering takes place in a haphazard and often redundant fashion, the cash register is of the most basic variety available (i.e. no computerization or product updating/procurement need tracking), and a host of other issues also exist that led to wasted money and wasted time for the business, as well as reducing the capacity for JavaBooks to each out to other customers and provide better quality services and more comprehensive product carryings. A few very simple yet profound changes to the way Margaret Smith does business can help make JavaBooks immensely more profitable.

Inventory, Invoice, and Receiving

Adopting proper information management technologies and systems can help Ms. Smith run JavaBooks far more efficiently in many of the company's specific operations. By employing a more accurate and rigorously maintained electronic cataloging system that tracks incoming product through scanning (or manual entry if and when required) and that has been integrated with the cash register such that outgoing product is automatically deducted form an inventory database, Smith will...

In addition, these inventory tracking features can also measure sales trends, helping Smith to determine what types or genres of books are selling best and maximizing the efficiency of her capital resources as well as her shelf space (Ordanini 2006). These inventory tracking and controlling procedures can thus help JavaBooks and Margaret Smith both to save money and time and potentially to generate more revenue and profitability (Kaplan 2009).
The inventory tracking technologies can also be integrated with invoice generating systems, which can also be accessed and controlled manually, of course (Burgess 2002). In this way, ordering for certain products can be automated, occurring as the product begins to run low on shelves, and Smith (or her managers) can manually generate invoices through a highly simplified format that is much easier than starting anew with Excel each time (Burgess 2002). This will ultimately save on paperwork as well as time, making the business more eco-friendly as well as efficient (Kaplan 2009).

Obviously, proper inventorying and invoicing requires an effective integration of information generated by receiving activities, as well, and a variety of different technologies from barcode scanners to a several different choices of databases, communications systems with distributors, and other information technology software and hardware can be implemented to handle receiving information efficiently and effectively (Ordanini 2006). Incoming product can be immediately entered into the system, shelved as needed and stored in known quantities in a known location, making ongoing restocking easier, as well (Burgess 2002; Ordanini 2006). By employing a fully integrated system that allows for the processing of receivables information and data, ongoing inventory tracking, and an invoice generating system that can be automated to varying degrees, Margaret Smith can ensure that JavaBooks is operating with the east amount of wasted time and resources as possible when it comes to actually supplying…