Quality Chairs Incorporated (QC) manufactures chairs for industrial use. Laura Winters, the Vice President for Marketing at QC, concluded from market analysis that sales were dwindling for QC's standard three-foot chair due to aggressive pricing by competitors. QC's chairs sold for $550 whereas the competition's comparable chair was selling for $495. Winters determined that a price drop to $495 would be necessary to regain market share and reach a targeted annual sales level of 10,000 chairs. Cost data based on sales of 10,000 chairs: Budgeted Quantity Actual Quantity Actual Cost Direct materials (board feet) 88,000 79,500 $ 1,250,000 Direct labor (hours) 71,350 73,775 875,000 Machine hours (hours) 11,400 11,250 250,000 Finishing and packing (hours) 6,500 6,400 125,000 The current profit per unit is: Multiple Choice $250. $300. $400. $450. $475.
Q: 1. A company is evaluating two projects, A and B. The company's cost of capital has been determined…
A: Net present value calculation is one of the important calculation used in capital budgeting process…
Q: Mr Arendse has asked you for some assistance with his financials. The following balances appeared in…
A: Assets means all type of resources being held by the business. There may be current assets or non…
Q: What is the goal of a tax audit? A. To make sure you paying your imposed fines B. To make sure…
A: Tax audit means audit of the information provided in tax returns like income and expenditure are…
Q: QUESTION 1 If the actual fixed costs total $166500 with the actual number of units produced equal to…
A:
Q: Common stock-$10 par value, 100,000 shares authorized, 60,000 shares issued and outstanding Paid-in…
A: Retained earning are retained by the entity after its expenses which includes dividends paid.…
Q: Planet of the Grapes, Inc. makes a single product that it sells for $40 each. Variable costs are $15…
A: In order to calculate desired sales for a required level of profit: Desired sales = (Fixed cost +…
Q: Question. A schedule of machinery owned by Micco Co. is presented below: Total cost Salvage value…
A: Introduction: Depreciation is an accounting method that assigns the expense of a financial period…
Q: On January 15 , Tundra Co. sold merchandise to customers for cash of $ 41,000 ( cost $ 28,000 ) .…
A: A journal entry is the act of keeping records of any transaction either economic or non-economic.…
Q: On December 31, 2019. Cullumber Corporation had 141.600 common shares outstanding On April 30, 2020,…
A: Profitability of an entity can be calculated by earnings per share where it shows earnings of the…
Q: An example of a qualified benefit is an employer-subsidized cafeteria.
A: Cafeteria Plan: It is the plan / system which provide benefit to the employees in the tax rate. It…
Q: What is the proper treatment of share options when computing diluted earnings per share? Group of…
A: Lets understand the basics. Diluted EPS is EPS which shows true value of earning available for…
Q: purchased a Van on credit from Lang's £5,000. The correct entry will be
A: Introduction: Journals: All the business transactions are to be recorded in Journals. Journals are…
Q: Cumberland Co. sells $919 of inventory to Hancock Co. for cash. Cumberland paid $673 for the…
A: Perpetual inventory system is one of the inventory system which is used in business. Under this…
Q: Compute for the following (show solution): a. How much total profit should Technocraft recognize for…
A: Profit from lease for the lessor is equal to the difference between the market lease rentals and the…
Q: Draaksh Corporation sells premium quality wine for $70 per bottle. Its direct materials and direct…
A: Introduction: The break-even point is the moment at which the total cost of the firm equals total…
Q: The following transactions occured during 2014 for Northstar Corp which uses a perpetual inventory…
A: Cost of goods sold can be calculated by two methods the first is the direct method under which the…
Q: Question: Obtaining an understanding of an entity's internal control is more likely to be performed…
A: Introduction: Internal controls are a system of preventative measures set up to make sure that no…
Q: ABC Corporation’s capital structure includes 105,000 ordinary shares outstanding since 2020 and…
A: Diluted EPS = Net Income / All outstanding shares and convertible securities Net income =…
Q: On June 1, 2020, LM company purchased debt investment at amortized cost, 8,000 of P1,000 face value…
A: Investment in bonds: Investment in bonds is the scenario where the company acquires bonds either at…
Q: benefits of flexible budgeting on sustainability.
A: Flexible budget refers to the budget which adjusts to the activity levels of the business and this…
Q: Etling Center for State Government Policy, a nonprofit organization, receives a cash contribution…
A: Date Particulars Debit Credit 31 December, 2021 Restricted Cash Contribution - with Donor…
Q: Yssa Group of companies manufacture skin bleaching compound through continuous operations in two…
A: Yssa Group of companies manufacture skin bleaching compound through continuous operations in two…
Q: Amahle Mluleki is 68 years old and self-employed. She is the main member on Discovery, a registered…
A: Answer: b) R60,000 According to the applicable rules of tax legislation, if a taxpayer was unable…
Q: Examples of benefits include all of the following, EXCEPT: a) retirement benefits. b) paid vacation.…
A: Benefit: Reward-driven behavior is the result of having an outwardly focused incentive. It may be…
Q: Barrett Historical Society, a nonprofit organization, charges a $100 annual membership. Of this…
A: The standards referred to in the question pertain to different set of rules that are applicable in…
Q: A city is building a new park. To finance the construction of the park, the city will issue a…
A: Introduction: Journal entry is the act of recording transactions in an accounting journal. An…
Q: ming an LLC similar to forming a corporation? ) a) As with corporations, there are no documents to…
A: LLC refers to the form of a business structure type which helps the owner to safeguard their…
Q: Apr. 1 Sold merchandise for $3,800, with credit terms n/30; invoice dated April 1. The cost of the…
A: A Journal entry is a primary entry that records the financial transactions initially. The…
Q: On January 1, 2020, EF company purchased P1,000,000, 12% bonds for P1,065,000, a price that yields…
A: If face value of the bonds is less than the purchase price then such debt investments are purchased…
Q: Elliot & Hesse Inc. Manufactures ergonomic devices for computer users. Some of its more popular…
A: The cost plays an important role in the performance evaluation. the greater the cost the lower the…
Q: Jack borrowed $4239 at 7.8% to buy a used car. He paid the maturity value of $5460. Find the time of…
A: It is standard practice to calculate interest is using 360 days in a year. Accounting year have 360…
Q: During the year 2021, the following transaction took place: January 1 Elisha contributed additional…
A: Lets understand the basics. Journal entry is a recording of financial event and transaction in books…
Q: Digital learning that is synchronous
A: Introduction: There are two type of learning 1. Asynchronous Learning 2. Synchronous Learning
Q: The following data were gathered to use in reconciling the bank account of Eves Company: Balance per…
A: Bank Reconciliation is a document that compares the bank balance on an entity's balance sheet to the…
Q: Ishak Center for Families, a nonprofit organization, receives $300,000 from a donor who requires…
A: Given that, Cash received from donor = $300,000 Purpose of donation = matching funds Ishak center…
Q: Prepare the necessary journal entries on the books of Kelly Carpet Company to record the following…
A: Following is the journal entries for 1. Purchase of merchandise 2. Return of merchandise 3.…
Q: Exercises: a. The standard deviation of returns is 0.30 for Stock A and 0.20 for Stock B. The…
A: Hi There, Thanks for choosing Bartleby, as per the Honor guidelines we are supposed to give the…
Q: Stokely Center for Human Trafficking Rights has total net assets at June 30, 2021 of $475,000 and of…
A: Any contribution in a business by its owner is always considered under the financing section of cash…
Q: On January 1, 2018, HI company purchased P1,000,000, 12% bonds for P1,063,394, a price that yields…
A: Lets understand the basics. When debt investment purchased and designated at FVTPL then interest…
Q: Question: A company purchased equipment valued at $238,000. It traded in old equipment for a…
A: INTRODUCTION: The process of entering transactions into an accounting journal is known as a journal…
Q: 11. Which type of financial assets are purchased only with the intent of selling them in the near…
A: FVTPL is subsequently measured at fair value Any gain and loss in the fair value measurement to be…
Q: Principal 10-7. $1,000 10-8. $585 10-9. $1,200 Interest rate 8% 9% 12% Date borrowed Mar. 8 June 5…
A: The Question requires us to calculate Exact time, Interest and Maturity value. Since, Question has…
Q: A company's master budget for October is to manufacture and sell 60,000 units with fixed costs of…
A: Introduction: A budget is intended to anticipate an entity's financial outcomes and position for a…
Q: Bonita Company's budgeted sales and direct materials purchases follow. January was the first month…
A: The expected cash collection indicates the estimated collection for a given period, the expected…
Q: Journal Entries: Partnership Formation Art, Bart and Cath formed a partnership by contributing 40%,…
A: Hi student Since there are multiple questions, we will answer only first question. Partnership is…
Q: Blue Spruce Corp. has accounts receivable of $93.500 at March 31, 2022. Credit terms are 2/10, n/30.…
A: Journal entry is the primary step to record the transaction in the books of account. The adjusting…
Q: One drawback of ETFs is that investors: a) are forced to pay higher cost and fee as compared to…
A: ETF(Exchange Traded Funds) is an investment fund which includes stocks, bonds etc. They are traded…
Q: Xavier Davis is preparing the statement of cash flows using the indirect method for the National…
A: In the context of the given question, we need to find the right option from the available options.…
Q: A company purchased equipment valued at $263,000. It traded in old equipment for a $164,000 trade-in…
A: Introduction: Depreciation is the decrease in asset value brought on by things like time passing,…
Q: The partnership of Gordon, Handel, and Mitchell is considering possible liquidation because partner…
A: Liquidation is the end of the partnership. Partners will get the capital including the profit or…
Cost-Volume-Profit Analysis
Cost Volume Profit (CVP) analysis is a cost accounting method that analyses the effect of fluctuating cost and volume on the operating profit. Also known as break-even analysis, CVP determines the break-even point for varying volumes of sales and cost structures. This information helps the managers make economic decisions on a short-term basis. CVP analysis is based on many assumptions. Sales price, variable costs, and fixed costs per unit are assumed to be constant. The analysis also assumes that all units produced are sold and costs get impacted due to changes in activities. All costs incurred by the company like administrative, manufacturing, and selling costs are identified as either fixed or variable.
Marginal Costing
Marginal cost is defined as the change in the total cost which takes place when one additional unit of a product is manufactured. The marginal cost is influenced only by the variations which generally occur in the variable costs because the fixed costs remain the same irrespective of the output produced. The concept of marginal cost is used for product pricing when the customers want the lowest possible price for a certain number of orders. There is no accounting entry for marginal cost and it is only used by the management for taking effective decisions.
Quality Chairs Incorporated (QC) manufactures chairs for industrial use. Laura Winters, the Vice President for Marketing at QC, concluded from market analysis that sales were dwindling for QC's standard three-foot chair due to aggressive pricing by competitors. QC's chairs sold for $550 whereas the competition's comparable chair was selling for $495. Winters determined that a price drop to $495 would be necessary to regain market share and reach a targeted annual sales level of 10,000 chairs.
Cost data based on sales of 10,000 chairs:
| Budgeted Quantity | Actual Quantity | Actual Cost | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Direct materials (board feet) | 88,000 | 79,500 | $ 1,250,000 |
| Direct labor (hours) | 71,350 | 73,775 | 875,000 |
| Machine hours (hours) | 11,400 | 11,250 | 250,000 |
| Finishing and packing (hours) | 6,500 | 6,400 | 125,000 |
The current profit per unit is:
-
$250.
-
$300.
-
$400.
-
$450.
-
$475.
Trending now
This is a popular solution!
Step by step
Solved in 2 steps
- Bienestar, Inc., has two plants that manufacture a line of wheelchairs. One is located in Kansas City, and the other in Tulsa. Each plant is set up as a profit center. During the past year, both plants sold their tilt wheelchair model for 1,620. Sales volume averages 20,000 units per year in each plant. Recently, the Kansas City plant reduced the price of the tilt model to 1,440. Discussion with the Kansas City manager revealed that the price reduction was possible because the plant had reduced its manufacturing and selling costs by reducing what was called non-value-added costs. The Kansas City manufacturing and selling costs for the tilt model were 1,260 per unit. The Kansas City manager offered to loan the Tulsa plant his cost accounting manager to help it achieve similar results. The Tulsa plant manager readily agreed, knowing that his plant must keep pacenot only with the Kansas City plant but also with competitors. A local competitor had also reduced its price on a similar model, and Tulsas marketing manager had indicated that the price must be matched or sales would drop dramatically. In fact, the marketing manager suggested that if the price were dropped to 1,404 by the end of the year, the plant could expand its share of the market by 20 percent. The plant manager agreed but insisted that the current profit per unit must be maintained. He also wants to know if the plant can at least match the 1,260 per-unit cost of the Kansas City plant and if the plant can achieve the cost reduction using the approach of the Kansas City plant. The plant controller and the Kansas City cost accounting manager have assembled the following data for the most recent year. The actual cost of inputs, their value-added (ideal) quantity levels, and the actual quantity levels are provided (for production of 20,000 units). Assume there is no difference between actual prices of activity units and standard prices. Required: 1. Calculate the target cost for expanding the Tulsa plants market share by 20 percent, assuming that the per-unit profitability is maintained as requested by the plant manager. 2. Calculate the non-value-added cost per unit. Assuming that non-value-added costs can be reduced to zero, can the Tulsa plant match the Kansas City per-unit cost? Can the target cost for expanding market share be achieved? What actions would you take if you were the plant manager? 3. Describe the role that benchmarking played in the effort of the Tulsa plant to protect and improve its competitive position.At the beginning of the last quarter of 20x1, Youngston, Inc., a consumer products firm, hired Maria Carrillo to take over one of its divisions. The division manufactured small home appliances and was struggling to survive in a very competitive market. Maria immediately requested a projected income statement for 20x1. In response, the controller provided the following statement: After some investigation, Maria soon realized that the products being produced had a serious problem with quality. She once again requested a special study by the controllers office to supply a report on the level of quality costs. By the middle of November, Maria received the following report from the controller: Maria was surprised at the level of quality costs. They represented 30 percent of sales, which was certainly excessive. She knew that the division had to produce high-quality products to survive. The number of defective units produced needed to be reduced dramatically. Thus, Maria decided to pursue a quality-driven turnaround strategy. Revenue growth and cost reduction could both be achieved if quality could be improved. By growing revenues and decreasing costs, profitability could be increased. After meeting with the managers of production, marketing, purchasing, and human resources, Maria made the following decisions, effective immediately (end of November 20x1): a. More will be invested in employee training. Workers will be trained to detect quality problems and empowered to make improvements. Workers will be allowed a bonus of 10 percent of any cost savings produced by their suggested improvements. b. Two design engineers will be hired immediately, with expectations of hiring one or two more within a year. These engineers will be in charge of redesigning processes and products with the objective of improving quality. They will also be given the responsibility of working with selected suppliers to help improve the quality of their products and processes. Design engineers were considered a strategic necessity. c. Implement a new process: evaluation and selection of suppliers. This new process has the objective of selecting a group of suppliers that are willing and capable of providing nondefective components. d. Effective immediately, the division will begin inspecting purchased components. According to production, many of the quality problems are caused by defective components purchased from outside suppliers. Incoming inspection is viewed as a transitional activity. Once the division has developed a group of suppliers capable of delivering nondefective components, this activity will be eliminated. e. Within three years, the goal is to produce products with a defect rate less than 0.10 percent. By reducing the defect rate to this level, marketing is confident that market share will increase by at least 50 percent (as a consequence of increased customer satisfaction). Products with better quality will help establish an improved product image and reputation, allowing the division to capture new customers and increase market share. f. Accounting will be given the charge to install a quality information reporting system. Daily reports on operational quality data (e.g., percentage of defective units), weekly updates of trend graphs (posted throughout the division), and quarterly cost reports are the types of information required. g. To help direct the improvements in quality activities, kaizen costing is to be implemented. For example, for the year 20x1, a kaizen standard of 6 percent of the selling price per unit was set for rework costs, a 25 percent reduction from the current actual cost. To ensure that the quality improvements were directed and translated into concrete financial outcomes, Maria also began to implement a Balanced Scorecard for the division. By the end of 20x2, progress was being made. Sales had increased to 26,000,000, and the kaizen improvements were meeting or beating expectations. For example, rework costs had dropped to 1,500,000. At the end of 20x3, two years after the turnaround quality strategy was implemented, Maria received the following quality cost report: Maria also received an income statement for 20x3: Maria was pleased with the outcomes. Revenues had grown, and costs had been reduced by at least as much as she had projected for the two-year period. Growth next year should be even greater as she was beginning to observe a favorable effect from the higher-quality products. Also, further quality cost reductions should materialize as incoming inspections were showing much higher-quality purchased components. Required: 1. Identify the strategic objectives, classified by the Balanced Scorecard perspective. Next, suggest measures for each objective. 2. Using the results from Requirement 1, describe Marias strategy using a series of if-then statements. Next, prepare a strategy map. 3. Explain how you would evaluate the success of the quality-driven turnaround strategy. What additional information would you like to have for this evaluation? 4. Explain why Maria felt that the Balanced Scorecard would increase the likelihood that the turnaround strategy would actually produce good financial outcomes. 5. Advise Maria on how to encourage her employees to align their actions and behavior with the turnaround strategy.Danna Martin, president of Mays Electronics, was concerned about the end-of-the year marketing report that she had just received. According to Larry Savage, marketing manager, a price decrease for the coming year was again needed to maintain the companys annual sales volume of integrated circuit boards (CBs). This would make a bad situation worse. The current selling price of 18 per unit was producing a 2-per-unit profithalf the customary 4-per-unit profit. Foreign competitors kept reducing their prices. To match the latest reduction would reduce the price from 18 to 14. This would put the price below the cost to produce and sell it. How could these firms sell for such a low price? Determined to find out if there were problems with the companys operations, Danna decided to hire a consultant to evaluate the way in which the CBs were produced and sold. After two weeks, the consultant had identified the following activities and costs: The consultant indicated that some preliminary activity analysis shows that per-unit costs can be reduced by at least 7. Since the marketing manager had indicated that the market share (sales volume) for the boards could be increased by 50% if the price could be reduced to 12, Danna became quite excited. Required: 1. CONCEPTUAL CONNECTION What is activity-based management? What phases of activity analysis did the consultant provide? What else remains to be done? 2. CONCEPTUAL CONNECTION Identify as many nonvalue-added costs as possible. Compute the cost savings per unit that would be realized if these costs were eliminated. Was the consultant correct in the preliminary cost reduction assessment? Discuss actions that the company can take to reduce or eliminate the nonvalue-added activities. 3. Compute the unit cost required to maintain current market share, while earning a profit of 4 per unit. Now compute the unit cost required to expand sales by 50%, assuming a per-unit profit of 4. How much cost reduction would be required to achieve each unit cost? 4. Assume that further activity analysis revealed the following: switching to automated insertion would save 60,000 of engineering support and 90,000 of direct labor. Now, what is the total potential cost reduction per unit available from activity analysis? With these additional reductions, can Mays achieve the unit cost to maintain current sales? To increase it by 50%? What form of activity analysis is this: reduction, sharing, elimination, or selection? 5. CONCEPTUAL CONNECTION Calculate income based on current sales, prices, and costs. Then calculate the income by using a 14 price and a 12 price, assuming that the maximum cost reduction possible is achieved (including Requirement 4s reduction). What price should be selected?
- Bannister Company, an electronics firm, buys circuit boards and manually inserts various electronic devices into the printed circuit board. Bannister sells its products to original equipment manufacturers. Profits for the last two years have been less than expected. Mandy Confer, owner of Bannister, was convinced that her firm needed to adopt a revenue growth and cost reduction strategy to increase overall profits. After a careful review of her firms condition, Mandy realized that the main obstacle for increasing revenues and reducing costs was the high defect rate of her products (a 6 percent reject rate). She was certain that revenues would grow if the defect rate was reduced dramatically. Costs would also decline as there would be fewer rejects and less rework. By decreasing the defect rate, customer satisfaction would increase, causing, in turn, an increase in market share. Mandy also felt that the following actions were needed to help ensure the success of the revenue growth and cost reduction strategy: a. Improve the soldering capabilities by sending employees to an outside course. b. Redesign the insertion process to eliminate some of the common mistakes. c. Improve the procurement process by selecting suppliers that provide higher-quality circuit boards. Required: 1. State the revenue growth and cost reduction strategy using a series of cause-and-effect relationships expressed as if-then statements. 2. Illustrate the strategy using a strategy map. 3. Explain how the revenue growth strategy can be tested. In your explanation, discuss the role of lead and lag measures, targets, and double-loop feedback.Maxwell Company produces a variety of kitchen appliances, including cooking ranges and dishwashers. Over the past several years, competition has intensified. In order to maintainand perhaps increaseits market share, Maxwells management decided that the overall quality of its products had to be increased. Furthermore, costs needed to be reduced so that the selling prices of its products could be reduced. After some investigation, Maxwell concluded that many of its problems could be traced to the unreliability of the parts that were purchased from outside suppliers. Many of these components failed to work as intended, causing performance problems. Over the years, the company had increased its inspection activity of the final products. If a problem could be detected internally, then it was usually possible to rework the appliance so that the desired performance was achieved. Management also had increased its warranty coverage; warranty work had been increasing over the years. David Haight, president of Maxwell Company, called a meeting with his executive committee. Lee Linsenmeyer, chief engineer; Kit Applegate, controller; and Jeannie Mitchell, purchasing manager, were all in attendance. How to improve the companys competitive position was the meetings topic. The conversation of the meeting was recorded as seen on the following page: DAVID: We need to find a way to improve the quality of our products and at the same time reduce costs. Lee, you said that you have done some research in this area. Would you share your findings? LEE: As you know, a major source of our quality problems relates to the poor quality of the parts we acquire from the outside. We have a lot of different parts, and this adds to the complexity of the problem. What I thought would be helpful would be to redesign our products so that they can use as many interchangeable parts as possible. This will cut down the number of different parts, make it easier to inspect, and cheaper to repair when it comes to warranty work. My engineering staff has already come up with some new designs that will do this for us. JEANNIE: I like this idea. It will simplify the purchasing activity significantly. With fewer parts, I can envision some significant savings for my area. Lee has shown me the designs so I know exactly what parts would be needed. I also have a suggestion. We need to embark on a supplier evaluation program. We have too many suppliers. By reducing the number of different parts, we will need fewer suppliers. And we really dont need to use all the suppliers that produce the parts demanded by the new designs. We should pick suppliers that will work with us and provide the quality of parts that we need. I have done some preliminary research and have identified five suppliers that seem willing to work with us and assure us of the quality we need. Lee may need to send some of his engineers into their plants to make sure that they can do what they are claiming. DAVID: This sounds promising. Kit, can you look over the proposals and their estimates and give us some idea if this approach will save us any money? And if so, how much can we expect to save? KIT: Actually, I am ahead of the game here. Lee and Jeannie have both been in contact with me and have provided me with some estimates on how these actions would affect different activities. I have prepared a handout that includes an activity table revealing what I think are the key activities affected. I have also assembled some tentative information about activity costs. The table gives the current demand and the expected demand after the changes are implemented. With this information, we should be able to assess the expected cost savings. Additionally, the following activity cost data are provided: Purchasing parts: Variable activity cost: 30 per part number; 20 salaried clerks, each earning a 45,000 annual salary. Each clerk is capable of processing orders associated with 100 part numbers. Inspecting parts: Twenty-five inspectors, each earning a salary of 40,000 per year. Each inspector is capable of 2,000 hours of inspection. Reworking products: Variable activity cost: 25 per unit reworked (labor and parts). Warranty: Twenty repair agents, each paid a salary of 35,000 per year. Each repair agent is capable of repairing 500 units per year. Variable activity costs: 15 per product repaired. Required: 1. Compute the total savings possible as reflected by Kits handout. Assume that resource spending is reduced where possible. 2. Explain how redesign and supplier evaluation are linked to the savings computed in Requirement 1. Discuss the importance of recognizing and exploiting internal and external linkages. 3. Identify the organizational and operational activities involved in the strategy being considered by Maxwell Company. What is the relationship between organizational and operational activities?Boxer Production, Inc., is in the process of considering a flexible manufacturing system that will help the company react more swiftly to customer needs. The controller, Mick Morrell, estimated that the system will have a 10-year life and a required return of 10% with a net present value of negative $500,000. Nevertheless, he acknowledges that he did not quantify the potential sales increases that might result from this improvement on the issue of on-time delivery, because it was too difficult to quantify. If there is a general agreement that qualitative factors may offer an additional net cash flow of $150,000 per year, how should Boxer proceed with this Investment?
- Nico Parts, Inc., produces electronic products with short life cycles (of less than two years). Development has to be rapid, and the profitability of the products is tied strongly to the ability to find designs that will keep production and logistics costs low. Recently, management has also decided that post-purchase costs are important in design decisions. Last month, a proposal for a new product was presented to management. The total market was projected at 200,000 units (for the two-year period). The proposed selling price was 130 per unit. At this price, market share was expected to be 25 percent. The manufacturing and logistics costs were estimated to be 120 per unit. Upon reviewing the projected figures, Brian Metcalf, president of Nico, called in his chief design engineer, Mark Williams, and his marketing manager, Cathy McCourt. The following conversation was recorded: BRIAN: Mark, as you know, we agreed that a profit of 15 per unit is needed for this new product. Also, as I look at the projected market share, 25 percent isnt acceptable. Total profits need to be increased. Cathy, what suggestions do you have? CATHY: Simple. Decrease the selling price to 125 and we expand our market share to 35 percent. To increase total profits, however, we need some cost reductions as well. BRIAN: Youre right. However, keep in mind that I do not want to earn a profit that is less than 15 per unit. MARK: Does that 15 per unit factor in preproduction costs? You know we have already spent 100,000 on developing this product. To lower costs will require more expenditure on development. BRIAN: Good point. No, the projected cost of 120 does not include the 100,000 we have already spent. I do want a design that will provide a 15-per-unit profit, including consideration of preproduction costs. CATHY: I might mention that post-purchase costs are important as well. The current design will impose about 10 per unit for using, maintaining, and disposing our product. Thats about the same as our competitors. If we can reduce that cost to about 5 per unit by designing a better product, we could probably capture about 50 percent of the market. I have just completed a marketing survey at Marks request and have found out that the current design has two features not valued by potential customers. These two features have a projected cost of 6 per unit. However, the price consumers are willing to pay for the product is the same with or without the features. Required: 1. Calculate the target cost associated with the initial 25 percent market share. Does the initial design meet this target? Now calculate the total life-cycle profit that the current (initial) design offers (including preproduction costs). 2. Assume that the two features that are apparently not valued by consumers will be eliminated. Also assume that the selling price is lowered to 125. a. Calculate the target cost for the 125 price and 35 percent market share. b. How much more cost reduction is needed? c. What are the total life-cycle profits now projected for the new product? d. Describe the three general approaches that Nico can take to reduce the projected cost to this new target. Of the three approaches, which is likely to produce the most reduction? 3. Suppose that the Engineering Department has two new designs: Design A and Design B. Both designs eliminate the two nonvalued features. Both designs also reduce production and logistics costs by an additional 8 per unit. Design A, however, leaves post-purchase costs at 10 per unit, while Design B reduces post-purchase costs to 4 per unit. Developing and testing Design A costs an additional 150,000, while Design B costs an additional 300,000. Assuming a price of 125, calculate the total life-cycle profits under each design. Which would you choose? Explain. What if the design you chose cost an additional 500,000 instead of 150,000 or 300,000? Would this have changed your decision? 4. Refer to Requirement 3. For every extra dollar spent on preproduction activities, how much benefit was generated? What does this say about the importance of knowing the linkages between preproduction activities and later activities?Wright Plastic Products is a small company that specialized in the production of plastic dinner plates until several years ago. Although profits for the company had been good, they have been declining in recent years because of increased competition. Many competitors offer a full range of plastic products, and management felt that this created a competitive disadvantage. The output of the companys plants was exclusively devoted to plastic dinner plates. Three years ago, management made a decision to add additional product lines. They determined that existing idle capacity in each plant could easily be adapted to produce other plastic products. Each plant would produce one additional product line. For example, the Atlanta plant would add a line of plastic cups. Moreover, the variable cost of producing a package of cups (one dozen) was virtually identical to that of a package of plastic plates. (Variable costs referred to here are those that change in total as the units produced change. The costs include direct materials, direct labor, and unit-based variable overhead such as power and other machine costs.) Since the fixed expenses would not change, the new product was forecast to increase profits significantly (for the Atlanta plant). Two years after the addition of the new product line, the profits of the Atlanta plant (as well as other plants) had not improvedin fact, they had dropped. Upon investigation, the president of the company discovered that profits had not increased as expected because the so-called fixed cost pool had increased dramatically. The president interviewed the manager of each support department at the Atlanta plant. Typical responses from four of those managers are given next. Materials handling: The additional batches caused by the cups increased the demand for materials handling. We had to add one forklift and hire additional materials handling labor. Inspection: Inspecting cups is more complicated than plastic plates. We only inspect a sample drawn from every batch, but you need to understand that the number of batches has increased with this new product line. We had to hire more inspection labor. Purchasing: The new line increased the number of purchase orders. We had to use more resources to handle this increased volume. Accounting: There were more transactions to process than before. We had to increase our staff. Required: 1. Explain why the results of adding the new product line were not accurately projected. 2. Could this problem have been avoided with an activity-based cost management system? If so, would you recommend that the company adopt this type of system? Explain and discuss the differences between an activity-based cost management system and a traditional cost management system.Gaston Company manufactures furniture. One of its product lines is an economy-line kitchen table. During the last year, Gaston produced and sold 100,000 units for 100 per unit. Sales of the table are on a bid basis, but Gaston has always been able to win sufficient bids using the 100 price. This year, however, Gaston was losing more than its share of bids. Concerned, Larry Franklin, owner and president of the company, called a meeting of his executive committee (Megan Johnson, marketing manager; Fred Davis, quality manager; Kevin Jones, production manager; and Helen Jackson, controller). LARRY: I dont understand why were losing bids. Megan, do you have an explanation? MEGAN: Yes, as a matter of fact. Two competitors have lowered their price to 92 per unit. Thats too big a difference for most of our buyers to ignore. If we want to keep selling our 100,000 units per year, we will need to lower our price to 92. Otherwise, our sales will drop to about 20,000 to 25,000 per year. HELEN: The unit contribution margin on the table is 10. Lowering the price to 92 will cost us 8 per unit. Based on a sales volume of 100,000, wed make 200,000 in contribution margin. If we keep the price at 100, our contribution margin would be 200,000 to 250,000. If we have to lose, lets just take the lower market share. Its better than lowering our prices. MEGAN: Perhaps. But the same thing could happen to some of our other product lines. My sources tell me that these two companies are on the tail end of a major quality improvement programone that allows them significant savings. We need to rethink our whole competitive strategyat least if we want to stay in business. Ideally, we should match the price reduction and work to reduce the costs to recapture the lost contribution margin. FRED: I think I have something to offer. We are about to embark on a new quality improvement program of our own. I have brought the following estimates of the current quality costs for this economy line. As you can see, these costs run about 16 percent of current sales. Thats excessive, and we believe that they can be reduced to about 4 percent of sales over time. LARRY: This sounds good. Fred, how long will it take for you to achieve this reduction? FRED: All these costs vary with sales level, so Ill express their reduction rate in those terms. Our best guess is that we can reduce these costs by about 1 percent of sales per quarter. So it should take about 12 quarters, or three years, to achieve the full benefit. Keep in mind that this is with an improvement in quality. MEGAN: This offers us some hope. If we meet the price immediately, we can maintain our market share. Furthermore, if we can ever reach the point of reducing the price below the 92 level, then we can increase our market share. I estimate that we can increase sales by about 10,000 units for every 1 of price reduction beyond the 92 level. Kevin, how much extra capacity for this line do we have? KEVIN: We can handle an extra 30,000 or 40,000 tables per year. Required: 1. Assume that Gaston immediately reduces the bid price to 92. How long will it be before the unit contribution margin is restored to 10, assuming that quality costs are reduced as expected and that sales are maintained at 100,000 units per year (25,000 per quarter)? 2. Assume that Gaston holds the price at 92 until the 4 percent target is achieved. At this new level of quality costs, should the price be reduced? If so, by how much should the price be reduced, and what is the increase in contribution margin? Assume that price can be reduced only in 1 increments. 3. Assume that Gaston immediately reduces the price to 92 and begins the quality improvement program. Now, suppose that Gaston does not wait until the end of the three-year period before reducing prices. Instead, prices will be reduced when profitable to do so. Assume that prices can be reduced only by 1 increments. Identify when the first future price change should occur (if any). 4. Discuss the differences in viewpoints concerning the decision to decrease prices and the short-run contribution margin analysis done by Helen, the controller. Did quality cost information play an important role in the strategic decision making illustrated by the problem?
- Kimball Company has developed the following cost formulas: Materialusage:Ym=80X;r=0.95Laborusage(direct):Yl=20X;r=0.96Overheadactivity:Yo=350,000+100X;r=0.75Sellingactivity:Ys=50,000+10X;r=0.93 where X=Directlaborhours The company has a policy of producing on demand and keeps very little, if any, finished goods inventory (thus, units produced equals units sold). Each unit uses one direct labor hour for production. The president of Kimball Company has recently implemented a policy that any special orders will be accepted if they cover the costs that the orders cause. This policy was implemented because Kimballs industry is in a recession and the company is producing well below capacity (and expects to continue doing so for the coming year). The president is willing to accept orders that minimally cover their variable costs so that the company can keep its employees and avoid layoffs. Also, any orders above variable costs will increase overall profitability of the company. Required: 1. Compute the total unit variable cost. Suppose that Kimball has an opportunity to accept an order for 20,000 units at 220 per unit. Should Kimball accept the order? (The order would not displace any of Kimballs regular orders.) 2. Explain the significance of the coefficient of correlation measures for the cost formulas. Did these measures have a bearing on your answer in Requirement 1? Should they have a bearing? Why or why not? 3. Suppose that a multiple regression equation is developed for overhead costs: Y = 100,000 + 100X1 + 5,000X2 + 300X3, where X1 = direct labor hours, X2 = number of setups, and X3 = engineering hours. The coefficient of determination for the equation is 0.94. Assume that the order of 20,000 units requires 12 setups and 600 engineering hours. Given this new information, should the company accept the special order referred to in Requirement 1? Is there any other information about cost behavior that you would like to have? Explain.Feinan Sports, Inc., manufactures sporting equipment, including weight-lifting gloves. A national sporting goods chain recently submitted a special order for 4,600 pairs of weight-lifting gloves. Feinan Sports was not operating at capacity and could use the extra business. Unfortunately, the orders offering price of 12.80 per pair was below the cost to produce them. The controller was opposed to taking a loss on the deal. However, the personnel manager argued in favor of accepting the order even though a loss would be incurred; it would avoid the problem of layoffs and would help maintain the community image of the company. The full cost to produce a pair of weight-lifting gloves is presented below. No variable selling or administrative expenses would be associated with the order. Non-unit-level activity costs are a small percentage of total costs and are therefore not considered. Required: 1. Assume that the company would accept the order only if it increased total profits. Should the company accept or reject the order? Provide supporting computations. 2. Suppose that Feinan Sports has negotiated with the potential customer, and has determined that it can substitute cheaper materials, reducing direct materials cost by 0.95 per unit. In addition, the companys engineers have found a way to reduce direct labor cost by 0.50 per unit. Should the company accept or reject the order? Provide supporting computations. 3. Consider the personnel managers concerns. Discuss the merits of accepting the order even if it decreases total profits.Danna Wise, president of Tidwell Company, recently returned from a conference on quality and productivity. At the conference, she was told that many American firms have quality costs totaling 20 to 30% of sales. The quality experts at the conference convinced her that a company could increase its profitability by improving quality. However, she was of the opinion that the quality of Tidwell Company was much less than 20%probably more in the 4 to 6% range. However, because the potential for increasing profits was so great if she was wrong, she decided to request a preliminary estimate of the total quality costs currently being incurred. She asked her controller for a summary of quality costs, with the costs classified into four categories: prevention, appraisal, internal failure, or external failure. She also wanted the costs expressed as a percentage of both sales and profits. The controller had his staff assemble the following information from the past year, 20X1: a. Sales revenue, 37,240,000; net income, 4,000,000. b. During the year, customers returned 40,000 units needing repair. Repair cost averages 9 per unit. c. Twelve inspectors are employed, each earning an annual salary of 80,000. The inspectors are involved only with final inspection (product acceptance). d. Total scrap is 200,000 units. Of this total, ninety percent is quality related. The cost of scrap is about 10 per unit. e. Each year, approximately 800,000 units are rejected in final inspection. Of these units, seventy-five percent can be recovered through rework. The cost of rework is 1.80 per I unit. f. A customer cancelled an order that would have increased profits by 600,000. The customers reason for cancellation was poor product performance. g. The company employs 10 full-time employees in its complaint department. Each earns 48,600 a year. h. The company gave sales allowances totaling 180,000 due to substandard products being sent to the customer. i. The company requires all new employees to take its 4-hour quality training program. The estimated annual cost of the program is 120,000. Required: 1. Prepare a simple quality cost report classifying costs by category. 2. Compute the quality cost-sales ratio. Also, compare the total quality costs with total profits. Should Danna be concerned with the level of quality costs? 3. Prepare a pie chart for the quality costs. Discuss the distribution of quality costs among the four categories. Are they properly distributed? Explain. 4. Discuss how the company can improve its overall quality and at the same time reduce total quality costs. 5. By how much will profits increase if quality costs are reduced to 3% of sales?
