High density storage uses less space and makes keeping track of inventory easier. Storing the highest volume parts where they can be accessed easily and quickly reduces transaction time and increases profitability.

Replacing existing storage shelves with high density storage units can reduce a parts department's footprint by as much as 50 percent, while increasing the number of parts stored.

These eight tips can help in implementing a high density storage system and getting the most out of it:

1. Identify your fastest selling parts
To discover the fastest moving parts, run a report from your business management system for the last12 months that shows your parts sales by unit volume. From that report, focus on the parts that sold the most in the last 12 months.  Store these parts as close to the parts counter as possible.

2. Use a high density storage cabinet near the service counter
The cabinet should be stocked with the 100 to 200 fastest moving parts. Make sure it's within easy reach (two steps) of parts department personnel at each point of sale. The goal is to reduce the average transaction time, allowing both service department and walk-in customers to be processed more quickly. By keeping the parts that are sold most frequently close to the transaction counter, you reduce time lost by having to go to the back room for a part. Storing these best sellers in high density drawers also results in better inventory control by giving parts personnel a visual inventory.

3. Duplicate your fastest moving parts
Consider duplicating your fast moving parts at each check-out point on your parts counter.  So, if you have two walk-up positions, have the same fast-moving parts in both locations.  Again, your goal is to reduce transaction time, lowering your labor cost and improving the chances for happy satisfied customers.

4.Organize your high density storage cabinets by type
How parts are organized within the high density storage cabinet is also key. The most efficient way to store parts is by type.  For example, automobile dealerships should keep all the spark plugs together, as well as fuel filters, primer bulbs, pulleys, spindles, and springs. Once labels have been affixed to the drawers and bins, anyone can locate a part more easily by visually finding it among like parts. Because 75-80 percent of all fast-moving parts can be stored this way at the parts counter, retrieval time is significantly lowered.

Consider organizing multiple manufacturers with similar parts together for easy cross referencing. When customers come in looking for parts, the parts clerk can open up the drawer that has a particular part, from a variety of manufacturers, stored in one place. They can select the correct one without having to rely on a parts look-up function.

Efficiencies achieved by high density cabinet storage systems organized this way can even reduce parts department staffing needs, greatly improving the return on investment for the new storage system.

5. Select shelving for larger items
You are not going to want to store the bigger bulkier items in a cabinet.  A 5-inch cube or smaller is the optimum size to take advantage of the power of high density storage.  Shelving is probably still the best option for storing larger, bulkier items.

6. Use a drawer organization system
Once you have determined which parts would be a good fit, think about how you would organize them.  In most cases you will identify each part with an exact location using an alpha-numeric system, for example, Cabinet A, Drawer 1, Row A, position 1. Using primer bulbs as an example, if you had 5 different primer bulbs, they might be stored in Cabinet A, Drawer 1, Row A, position 1, position 2, position 3, and so forth. They are all together, easy to find and easy to inventory.