60  48 loads are block stacked five high using 10 wide aisles. 200 unit loads of a product are received; a safety stock level of 20 unit loads is desired. In this case, suppose 20 units loads of the previous lot of the product are in the warehouse at the time of receipt of the current lot. Due to the random nature of demand for the product, the probability distribution for the amount of the particular lot of product in inventory is given as follows:

Inventory Level Probability Inventory Level Probability 200 .10 100 .04 190 .02 90 .04 180 .02 80 .06 170 .02 70 .06 160 .02 60 .06 150 .02 50 .08 140 .02 40 .08 130 .04 30 .08 120 .04 20 .08 110 .04 10 .08 Determine the row depth for block stacking that minimizes the average amount of floor space over the lifetime of a lot of the particular product in question.

a. Use continuous approximation based on uniform demand.

b. Using enumeration, determine a local minimum near the solution obtained in part (a).