Marketing Concepts, Inc. (MCI) is a full-service market research company. MCI is being hired to interview registered voters in a district to gain insight into their opinions about certain issues. Each voter is to be interviewed in person. The costs of interviewing different types of voters vary due to the differences in proportion throughout the population. Based on previous studies, estimates of the interview costs for different types of voters are as follows:

	Cost Per Interview
Gender	Democrat	Republican	Independent
Male	$ 10.5	$ 8.5	$ 12.5
Female	$ 13	$ 12	$ 14

The contract called for MCI to conduct interviews under the guidelines given below. MCI’s goal is to develop an interview plan that will satisfy the contract requirements at a minimum total interviewing costs.

Part I.Linear Programming (LP) Model

Please formulate a linear programming (LP) model. Make sure you clearly define the decision variables, write the objective, and constraints. Please follow the steps below.

1. Define the decision variables.

1. Write the objective.

1. Write the constraints (which are the contract requirements):
2. There must be at least 5,000 total interviews.

1. At least 1,200 Independent voters must be interviewed.

1. At least 2,000 males must be interviewed.

1. At least 1,800 females must be interviewed.

1. No more than 40% of those interviewed may be Democrats.

1. No more than 30% of those interviewed may be Republicans.

1. No more than 20% of those interviewed may be Republican males.

1. Each of the six types of voters must be represented by at least 10% of the total interviews.

1. Constraints on decision variables.

Part II. Spreadsheet Model and Solver Model

Construct a spreadsheet (Excel) model and solve the problem by Excel Solver. Please generate the Answer Report and Sensitivity Report from Excel Solver. Answer the following questions based on the output of Excel Solver.

1. What is the optimal interview plan?

1. How much is the minimum cost?

Answer rating: 100% (QA)

Let 1 2 3be the numbers of Male Democrat Replublican and Inde... View the full answer