Introduction to Traceability
Learn how our traceability and compliance features allow you to track your products from the purchase of material through to the ultimate sale.
What We'll Cover
- What is Traceability?
- Assigning Lot Numbers to Material Purchases
- Linking Lots to Manufactures
- Assigning manufactures to orders
- Traceability Reporting
What is Traceability?
Traceability is the ability to track products, parts, and materials throughout your supply chain. By recording data at each stage of production, from sourcing raw materials to manufacturing and distribution, you can ensure your products meet quality and safety requirements.
Having complete traceability means you can identify the source of any issues or defects quickly and take corrective action without delay. It also supports compliance with regulations such as GMP and CPSC standards, and helps build trust with customers who value transparency in the products they buy.
Read more: Guide to Material Traceability for Small Manufacturers
Assigning Lot Numbers to Material Purchases
Lot numbers are identification numbers assigned to batches of purchased materials. These may be supplied by your vendor or created by you. Adding lot numbers to your purchases via the Add Purchase form allows you to connect raw materials to the products you eventually sell.
In the example below, a purchase was made for a batch of 1L glass bottles, which were then assigned to the lot number 23432DP.
This number is then stored with the material record in Craftybase, under the Lots tab, so you always know which batch was used in your manufactures.
Linking Lots to Manufactures
Once lot numbers are in the system, they can be linked to manufactures. This step creates a connection between a purchased batch of material and the finished products that used it.
Continuing the example above, if a 1L Glass Bottle with lot number 23432DP is used to make a batch of Reusable Glass Bottles, you can record this on the manufacture form. This ensures the specific batch of oil is directly tied to that production run.
Assigning manufactures to orders
To complete the traceability chain, you can link each order to the exact manufacture that fulfilled it. This ensures that every product sold is tied back to the batch that created it.
- Go to the order you'd like to update.
- Click the ⋮ menu next to the order number.
Choose Link Manufacture.
- In the search box, begin typing the batch code or manufacture reference.
- If the manufacture already exists, type the manufacture code and select it from the dropdown list.
- If it doesn’t exist yet, click the + icon to create a new manufacture directly from this screen.
- After selecting or creating the manufacture, click Save.
Assigning a manufacture links the sold product back to the exact batch it came from. This ensures full traceability for quality control, recalls, and compliance.
Traceability Reporting
Once lot numbers and manufactures are consistently linked, you can use the Material Traceability Report to view a full history of any batch. The report shows all purchases, manufactures, and orders connected to that lot.
This report will display all expenses, manufactures, and orders that have involved a particular lot of material, allowing you to have the information at your fingertips to initiate a product recall if need be.
As you can see from the report, we can quickly identify that the order VP28RG has been shipped a product manufactured using the 23432DP lot number of Glass Bottles. In the case of a material defect with the bottle, this means you can analyze the impact and begin recalls immediately without taking weeks to comb through your records.
FAQ
How can I automatically link a manufacture to my orders?
To automatically link a manufacture to an order, enable the Auto manufacture setting for the product. Once this is turned on, Craftybase will create and assign a manufacture to each incoming order without any manual steps.
Have some questions?
If you have any additional questions, please get in touch, and we'll be happy to give you a hand.