i worked a big telecomm place the last few years (just got laid off) and we had to inventory just our department....and it REALLY sucked. Last friday of EVERY month even. The first few times i had to do my section alone, i was team leader, but after it take every section over 6 hours to get HALF WAY DONE, they started pulling more people to help. We got it down to just a few hours total....but then they started to let us weigh-count stuff and they really helped. in the end, wiht like 7 teams, we coudl inventory the whole area in 2-3 hours and be within 10% each time (that's acceptable when you have to count 15,000 3mm piece of heat shrink and stuff)