Combine your inventory items to build finished goods (assemblies)

Learn how to use inventory assembly items to build and track your finished goods. You can do this in QuickBooks Desktop Premier, Enterprise, or Accountant.

New to tracking the products you manufacture? QuickBooks lets you combine inventory parts and other items to build a product. Check out our inventory assembly overview to learn how to get started.

Once you set up your product’s bill of materials, you can start building. When you build a new product, QuickBooks updates the stock of components you use. You don't have to worry about manually tracking your product's parts or materials.

Assemble your product in QuickBooks

1. From the Inventory menu, select Build Assemblies.
   Note: Don't see the Inventory menu? Go to Vendors and select Inventory Activities. Then Build Assemblies.
2. Select the product you want to build from the Assembly Item drop-down.
3. Check the quantity available for this product at the top. This helps you know how many more you need to build.
   Tip: Quantity available is how many of this product you have on hand, minus what’s ordered by customers and reserved for pending builds.
4. You can see the list of components you need to build your product. Review the quantity on hand, quantity needed, and other info.
5. Add the Quantity to Build. The numbers in Qty Needed column gets updated depending on the quantity you want to build.
   Tip: select the "Maximum number you can add to this build on this date" checkbox right at the bottom of your components list. This lets you know how many of this item you can build based on your current stock of components.
6. If you use another assembly item to build this product, check Automatically build required subassemblies. This lets QuickBooks build the assembly that you also use as a component.
7. You can add a Memo.
8. Select Save and Close.

If you see “Not enough components on hand”

This means you don’t have enough parts on hand to build the quantity you want. You have 2 options:

• Select Cancel and then decrease the number in Quantity to Build field.
• Or select Mark Pending for now. Once you have enough items in stock, you can go back to this build transaction and select Remove Pending Status.

Tip: You can select Show Shortage to see what components you need to reorder from your vendors.