About stock and release programs

You place one order for a production quantity. We manufacture it, hold it here, and ship against your releases as your build schedule calls for parts. You are invoiced as each release is delivered.

That last point is the one worth reading twice. Most suppliers will happily hold stock and bill you for all of it up front. Here the money moves when the parts do.

• One order covers a production quantity, at production pricing
• We hold the finished parts in our facility
• You release against your build schedule
• You are invoiced upon delivery, not upon ordering
• No minimum release quantity to negotiate before you start

Inventory and cash flow

Identification parts are cheap per piece and expensive to run out of. A line stopped for a missing serial plate costs far more than the plate.

The usual defences are both bad. Ordering small quantities repeatedly means paying setup costs again each time and accepting a lead time on every order. Ordering a year of parts at once means paying for a year of parts at once, finding somewhere to put them, and writing off whatever is left when the artwork changes.

What can be held

Anything we manufacture can go into a program — the service is not limited to one product type.

• Label sets as a single part number
• Kits built to one unit of your equipment
• Individual nameplates, rating plates, and serial plates
• Control panels and graphic overlays
• Safety labels, warning labels, and decals
• Roll labels wound to your applicator

Serial numbers and sequential data

Programs work particularly well where parts carry sequential data. A block of serial plates can be produced and held, then released in sequence so the numbers reach your line in order and nothing is duplicated or skipped.

Digital printing handles the variable data on the way in. See digital printing.

How a program starts

Stock and release RFQ checklist

• Which parts you want held, with artwork or current part numbers
• Annual volume for each, and how many units you build in a typical month
• Your preferred release frequency and typical release quantity
• Whether parts carry serial numbers or other sequential data
• Whether you want the parts held as individual items, label sets, or kits
• How far ahead you normally know your build schedule
• Any revision activity you expect on the artwork

If you do not have all of that yet, send what you have and call 319-895-8804. Customer service is open 8:00 AM–4:30 PM CST Monday through Thursday and 7:00 AM–3:30 PM CST Friday, and you will always reach someone in person.

Placing a release

Releases are deliberately low-ceremony. Call or email with the part number and the quantity you need, and the parts ship. There is no portal to learn and no minimum release quantity negotiated in advance.

Customer service is open 8:00 AM–4:30 PM CST Monday through Thursday and 7:00 AM–3:30 PM CST Friday, and you will always reach someone in person rather than a queue. You can also choose your shipping vendor, and scheduled delivery can be arranged so releases land on a known day each week or month.

Artwork revisions

This is the question worth asking any supplier holding your inventory, and the honest answer is that a revision is easier to manage when the stock is in one place.

When you revise a part, we know exactly how much of the old version remains and can tell you before you decide what to do with it. Remaining stock can be run down first, scrapped, or in some cases reworked — whichever the change allows. What does not happen is discovering a year of obsolete plates in your own warehouse after the change has already shipped.

Because parts are produced here, a revised version can go into production immediately and the program continues without a gap in supply.

Related capabilities

Stock and release runs on top of everything else we make. It combines most often with kitting and label sets to reduce a machine’s identification to one held part number. When a release has to move faster than planned, see rush services.