This means that when you buy a Dell today, the components inside it spent no more than 6 days in a Dell warehouse. With such a small backlog of inventory, Dell is able to deploy the latest technology quickly and price its new products more competitively. By the time a customer makes up his mind about a computer he sees advertised in the newspapers, Dell has packaged an even better deal advertised on their web site. Many praises have been sung to Dell's model of business. And rightly so.
Time is the PC industry's greatest enemy.
Inventory not sold loses value by the minute. What you buy today is old tomorrow and obsolete in a week. Keeping a slim inventory allows Dell to minimize that loss and to react fast to new technology. In 1996, Creative decided that it would make CD-ROM drives bundled with their sound cards, instead of outsourcing. By the time Creative drives made it to the market, the prices of CD-ROM drives had fallen drastically.