Nichols Company Casae Study

Supply chain operations focus on demand planning, forecasting, and inventory management. Forecasts estimate customer demand for a particular product during a specific period of time based on historical data, external drivers such as upcoming sales and promotions, and any changes in trends or competition. Using

Barilla, the leading pasta manufacturer in Italy, faces increasing problems related to demand fluctuation. Their distributors also suffer from high inventory holding costs and low service levels on the other hand. This report explains, why the company and their distributors are troubled with this situation and how Barilla intends to solve it. The problem Barilla experiences is called the “Bullwhip Effect”, i.e. that demand variability increases when moving up the supply chain. Several factors enforce this Bullwhip Effect, e.g. high lead times, poor demand forecasting, and batch ordering. In this report we will point out, that exactly those aspects can be identified as the underlying reasons for Barilla’s problems. In a

During the game, I realized that wide gaps in orders of every role in the supply chain such as factory, distributor and retailer create inventory management challenges. For example, distributor records 0units between week1-week 4 compared to retailer within the same period. The retailer records 3units, 5units, 2units and 2units between weeks 1- week 4. The same applies to factory with 0units from weeks 2-4. Addressing inventory management problems requires developing an average unit level to avoid disappointing customers when demand

Company is facing a challenge of potentially higher inventory costs. Rising prices may further result in changes in customer behavior and preferences.

In this final paper for Managerial Finance I will attempt to show how the supply chain inventory management method can be affected depending on the situation of the retailer. Studying the control method for problems in inventory, which would include both, excesses in inventory as well as shortages, and hoping to minimize loss.

Management 460 is a case studies course in the management of manufacturing and service processes and operations. The course addresses manufacturing and service process selection and analysis, forecasting, capacity planning, aggregate

There are various reasons for holding inventory. Inventory acts as a buffer between supply and demand fluctuations and irons out supply chain system failures. The smoother your supply chain operates and the better you are able to forecast the less inventory you have to hold, unless you gain some economies of scale in purchasing, transportation and or manufacturing. Especially for supermarket, holding inventory can lead to customer satisfaction and increase their loyalty. Customers tend to stop by most often at supermarket where they surely know the item is available.

Planning and Forecasting is a vital function of management especially as it is related to inventory management. Planning has four processes associated with it. They are establishing goals, formulating strategies, implementing the plan and evaluating its success. The planning process of inventory will assist the organization choose the correct inventory system resulting in reduced costs and increased efficiency. For any business, having large amounts of inventory could prove to be expensive. In most company’s the management team will forecast sales on a monthly basis in order to keep enough inventories to fill customer orders in a timely fashion but not have an overflow of stock. There are various types of

“In an age of increasing specialization, it is rare for one person to be knowledgeable in all aspects of a complex task” (Thompson, 2015, p. 88). In this case, the first step was to understand our incoming demand. For this, I relied on information technology to generate numerous reports as well as the expertise of our sales team. It was at that point that the data was analyzed in conjunction with an inventory specialist. After we had the knowledge of what current product to inventory, we then needed to establish a set of guidelines of how to qualify products in the future. Inventory control management processes were instituted as well as a supply an auditing system. These steps included information from organizational members from our manufacturing group, planning department, and procurement department. Finally, we needed to understand and facilitate the storage and shipping of the product. We enlisted the help of our warehouse employees as well as our transportation department. This type of project included various levels of the organization and required a tremendous amount of communication. The project workload was enormous and also had a substantial financial investment associated with it. Instrumental in the project’s success was the team’s cohesion, diversity, and strategies deployed

Manufacturing support performance cycles serve as the logistics of production. These functions maintain orderly and economic flow of materials and work-in-process inventory to support production schedules. The goal is to support manufacturing requirements in the most efficient manner. These are internal cycles to the firm, thus they are rarely affected by behavioral uncertainty. Customer accommodation performance cycles are those associated with processing & delivering customer orders. They link customers through timely & economical product availability. Physical distribution integrates marketing and manufacturing efforts. To improve the effectiveness forecast accuracy must improve to reduce uncertainty.

In this case study, production and operations management (POM) issues of a mid-size company, named as Scientific Glass Inc., in a highly growing market are studied. Using the background information on past actions of the company to correct inventory management and their results, and considering the market leadership opportunity, how inventory management approach can be made better is explained by evaluating different alternatives from different aspects. In the first part, critical POM issues are mentioned, following that these problems are analyzed. In the third part, alternative options are listed and then they are evaluated. Finally, considering

In order to achieve excellent production capacity and reducing the overall costs the production manager has to find an optimal structure of aggregate planning which will help achieving qualitative and quantitative aspects of the organization.

Tasks:  What should Alison do? o Develop plans to improve the inventory management o Develop time-based supply strategies to bring competitive advantages to the organization  Identify the functions and forms of inventory  What are alternatives for inventory management? o ABC classification o Supplier-managed inventories (SMI) o Just-on-time or Just-in-time (JIT) o Enhance the forecasting system (factor correlated with inventory variation)  Provide training programs for current and new hiring employees 1

This report provides the analysis and examples of inventory management system and forecasting methods of Walmart. Methods of analysis and evaluation include Walmart strategic vendor partnerships, fewer links in supply chain, cross docking, and technology. Results of methods mentioned show Walmart accruing a high inventory turnover ratio of 8.1 (Bloomberg). In comparison to other retailer on regional and global scale Walmart hits industry highs with 71.9% in market share

Aggregate planning is the process of developing, analyzing, and maintaining a preliminary, approximate schedule of the overall operations of an organization. The aggregate plan generally contains targeted sales forecasts, production levels, inventory levels, and customer backlogs. This schedule is intended to satisfy the demand forecast at a minimum cost. Properly done,