The Heartland Produce Company owns farms in the Midwest, where it grows and harvests potatoes. It then ships these potatoes to three processing plants in St. Louis, New Orleans, and Chicago, where different varieties of potato products, including potato chips, are produced. The company is experiencing increased demand, so it wants to buy one or more new farms to produce more potato products. The company is considering six new farms with the following annual fixed costs and projected harvest:

The company currently has the following additional available production capacity (tons) at its three plants, which it wants to utilize:
Available Capacity
Plant (thousands of tons)
St. Louis ......... 12
Dallas .......... 10
Chicago .......... 14
The shipping costs ($) per ton from the farms being considered for purchase to the plants are as follows:

Which of the six farms should the company purchase to meet available production capacity at the minimum total cost (including annual fixed costs and shippingcosts)?

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Fixed Annual Costs ($1,000s) $405 390 450 368 520 465 Projected Annual Harvest Farm (thousands of tons) 11.2 10.5 12.8 9.3 10.8 9.6 4. Plant (shipping costs, $/ton) St. Louis 18 13 16 19 Dallas 15 10 14 15 19 16 Chicago 12 17 18 16 12 12 rarm 14