The Yeasty Brewing Company produces a popular local beer known as Iron Stomach. Beer sales are somewhat seasonal, and Yeasty is planning its production and labor levels on March 31 for the next six months. Demand forecasts are as follows:

MONTHS	Production (days)	Expected demand (hundreds of cases)
April	11	85
can	22	93
June	20	122
july	23	176
August	sixteen	140
September	20	63

As of March 31, Yeasty had 86 workers on the payroll. During a 26-business-day period when there were 100 workers on the payroll, Yeasty produced 12,000 cases of beer. The cost of hiring each worker is $125, and the cost of firing each worker is $300. Maintenance costs amount to 75 cents per box per month. As of March 31, Yeasty expects to have 4,500 cases of beer in stock and wants to maintain a minimum inventory of 1,000 cases each month. It plans to start in October with 3,000 cases pending

a. Based on this information, find the minimum constant workforce plan for Yeasty over the six months, and determine the hiring, firing, and retention costs associated with that plan.

b. Suppose it takes a month to train a new worker. How will that affect your solution?

C. Suppose the maximum number of workers the company can hope to hire in a month is 10. How will that affect your solution to part (a)?

d. Formulate the levels of the problem as a linear program. [You may ignore the conditions in parts (b) and (c).]

e. Solve the resulting linear program. Round the appropriate variables and determine the cost of your solution.

F. Suppose Yeasty does not want to fire any workers. What is the optimal plan subject to this constraint?

Answer rating: 100% (QA)

a To find the minimum constant workforce plan we need to calculate the production required to meet the expected demand while considering inventory con... View the full answer