Are you ready for the thrilling conclusion to the chronicles of Dave Williams, private investigator? Hang on because you’re in for a treat! Be sure to read part 2 of “Something Fishy: The Tale of the Missing Inventory” before proceeding.
11:44 p.m. Inside an abandoned warehouse.
D.W. rushed forward and shined his flashlight down through the hole in the floor the woman had just fallen through. He heard a loud splash of water.
“Are you all right?” he yelled down to her. He caught a glimpse of her flailing her arms, trying to stay afloat.
“Help!” she cried through choked gasps. “Can’t swim!”
D.W. was relieved she was alive, but he had to move fast to help her. The ground of the basement looked very far away – too far for him to jump down. He looked around, desperately trying to find a ladder or another opening in the floor to follow her down. Thinking fast, he opened her purse and pulled out two items – a gun and an umbrella. He stuffed the gun into his pocket and kept the umbrella in his hand.
He ran back to the opening he had tripped on a few minutes ago and stomped down hard on it. After a few more times, he cracked a hole large enough for him to jump through. Gathering his courage, he hurled himself into the abyss.
Halfway down, D.W. opened the umbrella, which abruptly slowed his descent for a second. He hoped that was long enough. The umbrella folded under his weight and he resumed his fall. He landed hard on his ankle and fell to the ground in pain.
His ankle didn’t feel broken, so he pulled himself up and hunted the walls with his flashlight for a light switch. He found one, hobbled over to it and flipped it on. After a long pause, the basement was bathed in light. He sighed in relief.
He turned to see where the woman had fallen and saw her trapped in a giant fishbowl full of water. She was growing weaker every second, and he had little time to act. Closely examining the fishbowl, he noticed an escape hatch on the side.
D.W. couldn’t run. Without hesitation, he pulled the gun out of his pocket, aimed carefully and shot the lock holding the escape hatch shut. Water gushed out as the door swung open. When the fishbowl was finally empty, he made his way to the woman lying facedown on the ground. When he reached her, he found her coughing the water out of her lungs.
“Thank goodness you’re all right,” he said soothingly.
“Thank… you,” she said between coughs.
“You’re welcome. It looks like you should’ve taken your own advice about being careful. We almost had a real death.”
They spent a few minutes recovering from the stress of their ordeal. The woman saw more than a hundred boxes of unopened fishbowls on the basement floor around her.
“I think I cracked the case right after you did,” she said, smiling at D.W. “I found my missing inventory. But how did it end up down here?”
“You could blame bad construction, but the true culprits are inaccurate data and poor inventory management. Your fishbowls have been literally falling through the cracks of your warehouse instead of being sold to customers. I discovered the truth when I found a hole in the floor hidden under a file cabinet in the accounting room. If anyone noticed the problem, they swept it under the rug.”
The woman was taken aback at learning the cause of her company’s destruction. But then a few questions entered her mind. “Why would anyone order a 10,000-gallon fishbowl in the first place? And how did it ‘fall through the cracks’ and not shatter on the ground? And why was it conveniently full of water to break my fall?”
D.W. raised an eyebrow to acknowledge the implausibility of the situation, but the only explanation he could offer was, “I don’t come up with these stories, ma’am, I just live in them.”
She shrugged and asked what he was going to do now.
“I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to create software that will prevent inventory management crimes like this from ever happening. And I’ll call it the FBI. That’s short for FishBowl Inventory, in honor of my final investigative case.”
True to his word, D.W. created the most powerful crime fighter in the world of inventory management. The FBI has prevented many untimely business deaths by keeping products from falling through the cracks and bleeding their finances dry.
And that’s more or less how Fishbowl Inventory came into being. I told you this was an origin story. David Williams is now the CEO of Fishbowl Inventory, having hung up his fedora and trench coat long ago. Start your investigation into how Fishbowl can solve your toughest inventory mysteries by scheduling an inventory software demo right now.
11:44 p.m. Inside an abandoned warehouse.
D.W. rushed forward and shined his flashlight down through the hole in the floor the woman had just fallen through. He heard a loud splash of water.
“Are you all right?” he yelled down to her. He caught a glimpse of her flailing her arms, trying to stay afloat.
“Help!” she cried through choked gasps. “Can’t swim!”
D.W. was relieved she was alive, but he had to move fast to help her. The ground of the basement looked very far away – too far for him to jump down. He looked around, desperately trying to find a ladder or another opening in the floor to follow her down. Thinking fast, he opened her purse and pulled out two items – a gun and an umbrella. He stuffed the gun into his pocket and kept the umbrella in his hand.
He ran back to the opening he had tripped on a few minutes ago and stomped down hard on it. After a few more times, he cracked a hole large enough for him to jump through. Gathering his courage, he hurled himself into the abyss.
Halfway down, D.W. opened the umbrella, which abruptly slowed his descent for a second. He hoped that was long enough. The umbrella folded under his weight and he resumed his fall. He landed hard on his ankle and fell to the ground in pain.
His ankle didn’t feel broken, so he pulled himself up and hunted the walls with his flashlight for a light switch. He found one, hobbled over to it and flipped it on. After a long pause, the basement was bathed in light. He sighed in relief.
He turned to see where the woman had fallen and saw her trapped in a giant fishbowl full of water. She was growing weaker every second, and he had little time to act. Closely examining the fishbowl, he noticed an escape hatch on the side.
D.W. couldn’t run. Without hesitation, he pulled the gun out of his pocket, aimed carefully and shot the lock holding the escape hatch shut. Water gushed out as the door swung open. When the fishbowl was finally empty, he made his way to the woman lying facedown on the ground. When he reached her, he found her coughing the water out of her lungs.
“Thank goodness you’re all right,” he said soothingly.
“Thank… you,” she said between coughs.
“You’re welcome. It looks like you should’ve taken your own advice about being careful. We almost had a real death.”
They spent a few minutes recovering from the stress of their ordeal. The woman saw more than a hundred boxes of unopened fishbowls on the basement floor around her.
“I think I cracked the case right after you did,” she said, smiling at D.W. “I found my missing inventory. But how did it end up down here?”
“You could blame bad construction, but the true culprits are inaccurate data and poor inventory management. Your fishbowls have been literally falling through the cracks of your warehouse instead of being sold to customers. I discovered the truth when I found a hole in the floor hidden under a file cabinet in the accounting room. If anyone noticed the problem, they swept it under the rug.”
The woman was taken aback at learning the cause of her company’s destruction. But then a few questions entered her mind. “Why would anyone order a 10,000-gallon fishbowl in the first place? And how did it ‘fall through the cracks’ and not shatter on the ground? And why was it conveniently full of water to break my fall?”
D.W. raised an eyebrow to acknowledge the implausibility of the situation, but the only explanation he could offer was, “I don’t come up with these stories, ma’am, I just live in them.”
She shrugged and asked what he was going to do now.
“I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to create software that will prevent inventory management crimes like this from ever happening. And I’ll call it the FBI. That’s short for FishBowl Inventory, in honor of my final investigative case.”
True to his word, D.W. created the most powerful crime fighter in the world of inventory management. The FBI has prevented many untimely business deaths by keeping products from falling through the cracks and bleeding their finances dry.
And that’s more or less how Fishbowl Inventory came into being. I told you this was an origin story. David Williams is now the CEO of Fishbowl Inventory, having hung up his fedora and trench coat long ago. Start your investigation into how Fishbowl can solve your toughest inventory mysteries by scheduling an inventory software demo right now.