Pros & Cons of Fishbowl: Analysis of a Top Inventory Management Software in 2024

With over 5.5 million customers worldwide, Intuit’s Quickbooks is one of the top small business accounting software. However, its strength lies in its powerful accounting features and easy-to-use interface. When it comes to inventory management, Quickbooks could use some assistance from a third-party system.

When Intuit opened its doors to third-party developers, which provided added functionality to Quickbooks, Fishbowl quickly became the standard in seamless integration. Fishbowl lets you go beyond the capabilities of Quickbooks in inventory management and ensures data remains continually updated and consolidated.

This guide on the pros and cons of Fishbowl will help you decide if your business can benefit from adding this inventory management software to your tech stack, especially if you are using Quickbooks for your accounting needs. We’ll discuss some of the benefits of Fishbowl, as well as any potential shortcomings of the product.

The movement from traditional desktop accounting to cloud accounting has grown further as businesses became aware of the latter’s advantages: improved data accuracy, better collaboration, widespread availability, and reduced maintenance costs. By 2020, 78% of SMBs will be fully dependent on cloud-based accounting solutions to run their systems, and the business is projected to increase its market size from $2.62 billion today to $4.25 billion by 2023.

While accounting software monitors your company’s overall fiscal health, it is equally wise to pay attention to your inventory. In a retail vision study conducted in 2017 by Zebra Technologies, it was estimated that the worldwide cost of inventory distortion, including overstock, stock-outs, and shrinkage totaled $1.1 trillion, and that reducing stock-outs and overstocks can cut down a company’s inventory costs by 10%.

So, integrating your accounting program with an inventory management system makes perfect sense, if only to keep closer tabs on your finances. Both systems share everyday transactions like sales orders, bill of materials, and purchase requisitions, etc. With a consolidated setup, they can save you time and money, reduce labor requirements, and churn out more accurate reports on-demand, as well as better insights into the company’s resources and efficiency in managing them.

What is Fishbowl?

Fishbowl is an inventory management software that is ideal for SMBs, specifically those that are using Quickbooks. It works as a powerful asset tracking solution to manage assets, products and, stocks easily and more efficiently. The seamless integration between Fishbowl and Quickbooks means that they share the same database, and allows you to get a better and more accurate picture of your company’s warehousing health. This also translates into savings in terms of thousands of dollars, as acquiring Fishbowl means preserving your initial investment in Quickbooks and enjoying the benefits of integration.

Fishbowl’s robust tools allow you to complete your warehousing tasks easier and more efficiently. It takes up where Quickbooks left off and provides a fuller range of functions that help track items, monitor stock levels, and manage common tasks like creating job orders, bill of materials, or item movement.

Hailed as one of the top inventory management programs for QuickBooks, Fishbowl can easily integrate dozens of software and hardware solutions that link and automate many business processes. It offers additional solutions that further automate business processes, including CRM integration for ecommerce, shipping solutions, HR timekeeping services, customer payment processing, and more.

What industries benefit most from Fishbowl software?

Fishbowl’s robust inventory management and integration features make it an ideal tool for various industries beyond just general retail. Here’s a look at industries that could gain the most from using Fishbowl for their unique inventory and operations needs:

• Manufacturing: Fishbowl supports multi-level bill of materials (BOM), allowing manufacturers to manage complex assembly tasks. Its inventory tracking across locations and ability to generate work orders help streamline production workflows.
• Wholesale and Distribution: With features like multiple warehouse management and automated purchase orders, Fishbowl is well-suited for distributors. It enables seamless tracking of stock across locations and simplifies the process of transferring products between warehouses.
• E-commerce: Fishbowl’s e-commerce integrations with platforms like Shopify and WooCommerce make it an excellent choice for online retailers. Its pick, pack, and ship features, along with barcode generation, help e-commerce businesses efficiently fulfill orders and maintain accurate stock levels.
• Healthcare and Medical Supplies: Fishbowl’s advanced tracking features ensure that medical and healthcare businesses can manage supplies accurately. Automatic reorder points help avoid critical stock-outs, and barcode functionality improves accuracy in tracking sensitive medical items.
• Automotive Parts: The kitting feature in Fishbowl is particularly useful for automotive businesses, allowing them to create bundles of parts and accessories. Inventory management across multiple locations ensures that parts are readily available where needed, minimizing delays.
• Food and Beverage: For businesses in this sector, Fishbowl’s real-time inventory updates and customizable reports help in managing perishable goods. Automatic reordering ensures that essential stock is replenished without overstocking, and barcode generation aids in tracking items efficiently.

Fishbowl Advantages and Disadvantages

Seamless integration with Quickbooks 

This pros and cons of Fishbowl article starts with the software’s most prominent feature: seamless integration with Quickbooks. Having Fishbowl and Quickbooks work with the same database syncs your financial records with your inventory. This results in unnecessary manual data re-entries, and by extension, reduced occurrences of double entries or inaccurate/ mismatched records. The integration isn’t exclusive to Quickbooks; however, as Fishbowl also announced full integration with Xero, another popular cloud accounting software.

Fishbowl integration with Quickbooks and Xero

Suited for small and medium businesses 

As Quickbooks is designed for Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs), Fishbowl’s features and functionalities are similarly designed with SMBs in mind. Fishbowl helps squeeze more out of your previous Quickbooks investment through seamless integration, where both benefit from sharing the same database. However, larger companies with highly complex operations may still be better served by Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions.

Expanded inventory management

Fishbowl has plenty of features that take off from Quickbooks’s limitations. For example, Quickbooks can only create a bill of materials for simple assembly work, while Fishbowl can generate a bill of materials for both simple and multiple-level assembly work. For calculating costs, Quickbooks uses average costing and FIFO. Fishbowl ups the ante by supporting not just average cost and FIFO, but also LIFO and standard cost methods. Fishbowl also has functions totally unavailable in Quickbooks, such as Return Merchandise Authorization job status updates, and transfer orders between warehouses.

Manage Multiple Warehouses

Opening a new warehouse for your growing inventory shouldn’t be a cause of concern for your inventory management software. While Quickbooks sees only a single warehouse, Fishbowl treats each warehouse as separate locations, which means separate inventory reports. Each location can be further subdivided into different areas (receiving, dispatching, etc.). As an added convenience, Fishbowl allows you to transfer items between warehouses without the need for a sales/purchase order.

Generate New Barcodes

Barcodes have become a standard inventory system, as it’s a faster and more efficient way of tracking items compared to the old manual system. Quickbooks can deal with barcodes, but its ability is limited to recognizing and scanning existing barcodes. Fishbowl takes barcoding to the next level by allowing you to create, generate, and print new barcodes easily.

Fishbowl lets you create barcodes

Kitting convenience

Kitting, or the combining of several items to create a single unit, is a novel strategy that not only presents savings opportunities for both client and supplier but also helps move inventory faster. Quickbooks does not support kitting when dealing with sales orders but instead requires each item to be added individually. Fishbowl supports kitting, and even lets you include optional kit items, and adjusts the bundle price accordingly.

Automatic purchase orders

Stock-outs are one of the persistent headaches in inventory management, as replenishing a depleted item is more troublesome than ensuring stock levels are adequate. Fishbowl’s Auto Purchase Order feature automatically generates purchase orders when inventory items hit their reorder points. As a result, your business can now avoid incidences of zero or low inventory without having to do anything. Meanwhile, Quickbooks does not have this feature.

Fishbowl’s auto purchase order feature

Extensive support documentation

Fishbowl’s pricing scheme entails a one-time purchase that grants users non-expiring use of the software. However, an annual license fee is required to avail of the latest software updates and continuous customer support. Apart from customer support, Fishbowl created a wiki resource page that provides an extensive library of training videos, how-to guides, and step-by-step instructions. As time zone difference affects the rate of response, the Fishbowl resource pages may provide a quicker source of answers to common problems.

Fishbowl documentation site

Shared server space

Fishbowl works more efficiently when its server also hosts Quickbooks. It is still possible to run Fishbowl and Quickbooks on separate servers, but this sometimes leads to connectivity problems between the separate servers connect. Also, periodic batch updates take longer to complete when Fishbowl and Quickbook servers are communicating using separate servers.

Reports generation

With just a few clicks, Fishbowl easily generates and prints standard reports (bill of materials, sales orders, job orders, etc.). However, creating and printing custom reports require tweaking to get the desired results. While this allows for more flexibility in creating reports, some users find the adjustments more cumbersome than expected.

Fishbowl create custom report feature

Will Fishbowl make sense for your business right now?

Taking your business to the next level entails upgrading your tools as well. Fishbowl offers the ability to expand your inventory management capabilities without having to replace your current accounting software. It is priced reasonably with a good entry point for those who are weaning themselves from free inventory systems or planning for a solid foundation. As this pros and cons of Fishbowl article outlined, the pluses far outweigh the minuses; thus, the software is worth your time and money.

More so, for small- and medium-sized companies looking for seamless integration with Quickbooks, Fishbowl should be one of their top choices and, in fact, a main component of their small business tech infrastructure.

Key Insights

• Seamless Integration with QuickBooks: Fishbowl offers seamless integration with QuickBooks, ensuring synchronized financial and inventory data, reducing manual entries, and minimizing errors.
• Tailored for SMBs: Fishbowl is designed specifically for small and medium-sized businesses, maximizing the value of existing QuickBooks investments and providing a robust inventory management solution.
• Advanced Inventory Management: Fishbowl enhances inventory management with features like multi-level bill of materials, various costing methods, and advanced item tracking.
• Multiple Warehouse Management: Fishbowl supports the management of multiple warehouses, allowing for separate inventory reports and easy item transfers between locations.
• Barcode Generation: Fishbowl allows for the creation, generation, and printing of new barcodes, surpassing QuickBooks’ limited barcode capabilities.
• Kitting Convenience: Fishbowl supports kitting, enabling the bundling of multiple items into a single unit, which QuickBooks does not support.
• Automatic Purchase Orders: Fishbowl can automatically generate purchase orders when inventory hits reorder points, preventing stock-outs.
• Extensive Support Documentation: Fishbowl offers a comprehensive library of training videos, how-to guides, and step-by-step instructions, in addition to ongoing customer support.
• Shared Server Space: Optimal performance is achieved when Fishbowl and QuickBooks share the same server, reducing connectivity issues.
• Flexible Report Generation: Fishbowl easily generates standard reports and allows for custom report creation, though it may require some adjustments.

FAQ

1. What is Fishbowl? Fishbowl is an inventory management software designed for small and medium-sized businesses, particularly those using QuickBooks. It offers robust tools for tracking assets, managing stock, and integrating seamlessly with QuickBooks to provide a comprehensive view of warehousing and financial health.
2. How does Fishbowl integrate with QuickBooks? Fishbowl integrates seamlessly with QuickBooks, sharing the same database to ensure synchronized financial and inventory data. This integration reduces the need for manual data entry and minimizes the risk of errors or mismatched records.
3. Is Fishbowl suitable for large enterprises? While Fishbowl is tailored for small and medium-sized businesses, larger enterprises with complex operations might find Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions more suitable due to their extensive and customizable features.
4. Can Fishbowl handle multiple warehouses? Yes, Fishbowl supports multiple warehouses, treating each as a separate location with its own inventory reports. It also allows for easy item transfers between warehouses without requiring sales or purchase orders.
5. What are the advantages of using Fishbowl for barcode management? Fishbowl enhances barcode management by allowing users to create, generate, and print new barcodes, unlike QuickBooks, which is limited to recognizing and scanning existing barcodes.
6. How does Fishbowl handle kitting? Fishbowl supports kitting, enabling users to bundle several items into a single unit. This feature is particularly useful for creating product kits and adjusting bundle prices, a functionality that QuickBooks does not support.
7. What support resources does Fishbowl offer? Fishbowl provides extensive support documentation, including training videos, how-to guides, and step-by-step instructions through its wiki resource page. Additionally, customer support is available for ongoing assistance.
8. Can Fishbowl automatically generate purchase orders? Yes, Fishbowl has an Auto Purchase Order feature that automatically generates purchase orders when inventory items reach their reorder points, helping to prevent stock-outs and ensuring adequate stock levels.
9. What are the benefits of sharing server space between Fishbowl and QuickBooks? Sharing server space between Fishbowl and QuickBooks enhances performance by reducing connectivity issues and speeding up batch updates. This setup ensures smoother and more efficient integration.
10. How does Fishbowl handle report generation? Fishbowl can easily generate standard reports with just a few clicks. It also allows for the creation and customization of reports, providing flexibility, although some users may find the customization process cumbersome.

By Daniel Epstein

Daniel Epstein is a senior financial research analyst at FinancesOnline and the architect behind our Fintech and ERP content division. His main areas of expertise are blockchain technologies, cryptocurrencies, and the use of biometrics in fintech solutions. His work has been frequently quoted by such publications as Forbes, USA Today, Entrepreneur, and LA Times. With more than 1,800 solutions scrutinized in the last 5 years spent on our team he always prioritized offering readers an unbiased perspective on modern financial technologies.