Implementing Inventory Management Tools in Clothing Closets

In order to improve efficiency in a school’s clothing closet, we sought to find strategies for implementing inventory system tools. Our goal is to reduce overstock, prevent shortages, and find easier donation management. Although Ai tools may be expensive, affordable alternatives such as QR codes or basic inventory software could make a difference in Hire Attire.

 

Using Inventory management software

We aimed to find an efficient way to keep track of inventory. Inventory management software helps the clothing closet keep track of donated items and what items are available. According to ApparelMagic (2025) “Inventory management software for the apparel industry tracks clothing, shoes, jewelry, accessories and related items as they move between locations”. This shows how this software can keep track of what we have available at all times, reducing the risk of overstocking or losing clothing.

 

How to Implement

• Choosing the right software: Select software designed for tracking clothing items (barcode scanning/or QR tagging)

• Train staff:Provide training so everyone working with keeping track of inventory knows how to use the software.

• Update right away: Immediately donations come in, log them into the system immediately. This keeps inventory information up to date.

 

Hire Attire Note: Affordable options like zoho, Qr code inventory, tracking inventory manually, or using a spreadsheet can be useful for hire attire. For example, Zoho’s standard plan costs $29 a month. Software includes inventory tracking feature, option to categorize and organize donated items, creates easy reports of what’s in stock, allows you to keep track of at least 500 orders every month, and it includes help videos on how to use features.

 

Preventing shortages and overstock

Overstocking and shortages are common for clothing stores. Overstocks take up a lot of space and shortages mean that closets don't have enough items of clothing they actually need. Wild (2018) explains that a good inventory management system can help keep an inventory balanced.

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How it affects Hire Attire

• Closet space is already limited; overstocking will result in wasted storage space.

• Shortages will prevent students from getting clothing they need

 

How to Implement

• Set limits for inventory: Decide on the minimum and maximum amount each item can have. The system should alert staff if it’s under and below so they can fix it. 

• Regular Inventory Checks:Check Inventory levels regularly to make sure items are not piling up or running out.

• If overstocked, Hire attire can donate excess items to places such as goodwill

• If understocked, Hire attire can post donation requests on their website/social media to ask students for specific items

 

Tracking Donations

Tracking donations is important for managing inventory. Using a digital tagging system ensures that every item is recorded in the system. Madan (2025) states that “Ai tools could help make the process less tedious, reducing human errors.” While Hire Attire might not be able to use Ai tools, a simple QR code system or spreadsheet would be a great idea.

 

How to Implement

• Use digital tags: Attach tags like barcodes to donated items when it arrives. Log details such as size, and category of clothing into the computer system. (free tools like QR code monkey can be used to generate custom QR codes making it easy to track items)

• Record things such as size/category into a spreadsheet

• Generate reports weekly to see items coming in or going out

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Organizing Donations Properly

When donations arrive, it is important to organize them immediately. If donations are not sorted correctly, it can be hard to find items that students need. According to Optoro (2024) a software “tracks and dispositions inventory as it flows through a warehouse until it reaches consumers”. Companies handling large clothing amouts use efficient tracking systems to make the process easier. 

 

How to Implement

• Sort clothing items by category: Organize clothes that are donated into categories (Mens, Women) to make clothing easier for students to find 

• Use a Software System: Implement inventory system that tracks location and status of clothing items.

 

Figure 4:  This chart shows methods other colleges use to track inventory. Manual counting is the most common method used by 50.3% of colleges. Spreadsheets (Excel, Google sheets) are used by 24.6%. 25.1% do not track inventory. Qr codes aren’t accounted for on the chart which means no colleges have used them. This chart suggests that half of the responders rely on manual counting. The research our team found suggests that Hire Attire could consider using manual counting or spreadsheets to track inventory.

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