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Excel spreadsheet for students.

Excel spreadsheet for students.

The general manager of the Wilkins plant in Paso Robles, California has received instructions from head office to reduce inventory by 30 per cent in the next quarter. Although inventory had been accumulating over the past years, this has been seen as a benefit to the company for a couple of reasons. One is that the cost of raw materials has risen in the past year. The second is that the company has a policy of no layoffs, so having inventory in stock allows the company to minimize the use of overtime and temporary workers. The general manager wondered whether revising the production planning process would be enough to solve Wilkins' inventory problems.

The materials manager at the Wilkins plant in California is surprised to find out that an auditor's report recommends a second annual physical inventory count. He had concerns about the level of the inventory that was conducted, he knew changes were needed and must decide what alternatives to consider. Students are exposed to the difficulties of managing inventory as well as typical problems that occur in growing businesses. Students will diagram the bill of material, conduct a materials requirement planning explosion and determine appropriate levels of safety stock, and address concerns associated with the high level of inventory.

The newly promoted inventory manager wonders if there is an easier, more reliable means of forecasting sales demand. Currently, forecasts are based on the plant manager's, sales/marketing manager's, and inventory manager's knowledge of industry trends, competitive strategies, and sales history. The inventory manager must decide if using statistical forecasting methods would ease the forecasting process and make the forecasts more reliable. Students are exposed to different forecasting techniques, including executive opinion, linear regression, and time series. The data characteristics include seasonality, trend, and random fluctuations.

The general manager of the Wilkins plant in Paso Robles, California has received instructions from the head office to reduce inventory by 30% in the next quarter. Although inventory had been accumulating over the past years, this had been seen as a benefit to the company for a couple of reasons. One is that the cost of raw materials has risen in the past year. The second is that the company has a policy of no layoffs, so having inventory in stock allows the company to minimize the use of overtime and temporary workers. The general manager wondered whether revising the production planning process would be enough to solve Wilkins' inventory problems.

The newly promoted inventory manager wonders if there is an easier, more reliable means of forecasting the sales demand. Currently forecasts are based on the plant manager, sales/marketing manager and inventory manager's knowledge of industry trends, competitive strategies and sales history. He must decide if using statistical forecasting methods would ease the forecasting process and make the forecast more reliable. Students are exposed to different forecasting techniques, including executive opinion, linear regression and time series. The data characteristics include seasonality, trend and random fluctuations.

The materials manager at the Wilkins plant in California is surprised to find out that an auditor's report recommends a second annual physical inventory count. He has concerns about the level of the inventory that was conducted, knows changes are needed, and must decide what alternatives to consider. Explores the difficulties of managing inventory as well as typical problems that occur in growing businesses.