How do you organize your inventory?

[Osric]

I've noticed a lot of threads that have things like "a customer picks through my stacks looking for specific boards..." and it made me wonder how different people organize their stock.

Do you just have it stacked like 2x4s at Lowes?  Do you have separate piles based on species, grade, size, etc?  Have you found one system to work better for controlling inventory or to limit the number of 'pickers' that like to pick and choose every board? 

All the wood I have right now is basically still stickered and is air drying (in a shed that frequently gets over 110 degrees).  I'm not looking to sell at this point (have too many home projects to do to sell  :D ), but am curious as to the different methods people use to store their wood after it has been dried and is 'marketable'.

[metalspinner]

I don't sell my lumber, but when I need it , the board I'm looking for is always on the bottom. :-\  It would take lots of space to sort the lumber the way I would like.  By species, grade, lenghth, and thickness.  A fork lift would make things much easier and more compact, because you can remove unneeded bundles from the top and place them off to the side.

[TexasTimbers]

Maybe stack them upright. I don't mean dry them upright. I stack alot of my boards upright in an unorginized, haphazard, randomly-selected location and they still get in the way.

[Justin L]

Just throw them in the storage room & close the door real fast before they fall down:) (like tupperware in the cabinet)

I keep some(100bf each species+-) standing on end, so you can see the length and sort easily, and less needed ones in pkgs for the forklift to get. The forklift is MUCH needed.

My shorts rack is also verticle so you can see the length.

Even with a forklift, the one board you need will still be on the bottom of the bottom pkg in the back row. And you just placed it there because you figured it was the least needed...

Lumber sales & woodworking are just an excersize in futility  :

[Tom]

A customer's intuition would be that all of the wood in a stack is the same price.  For that reason, it would behoove someone who is retailing different prices of wood to have the wood separated by price and maybe grade.  When you are retailing small quantities of figured wood, you are sellilng "by the piece".  Don't expect your customer to search a pile of wood for something to pay premium for, that is your job.

[Cedarman]

We sticker and stack according to width of board, length and thickness.  A customer is never allowed to sort through a stack.  They give us the specs as to what they want and then we get the wood for them.

All rules can be broken but it costs the customer money.  The must pay a nice premium to get the boards they want.  And they must stack the stack back the way it was.  I am insured.