Operations and Supply Chain Management

Operations and Supply Chain Management

Task A:

Draw two process flow diagrams. The first is for the “initial receipt of new fashion product and distribution to retail outlets” process, and the second is for the “retail outlet replenishment and style close-out” process for coats.

Process Flow: initial receipt of new fashion product and distribution to retail outlets

Central Distribution System

Process Flow Diagram: retail outlet replenishment and style close-out

Task B

Push Strategy

Push means push, or manage processes in advance of the needs of customers.The management push vice versa is characterized by an advance of the entrance of the materials in the factory in order to ensure the delivery time required by the market; this is done using the weather: if these are incorrect stocks are generated whose effect is to lengthen the time of this production (P) instead of shortening the delivery time (D = Delivery), the feed rate is not adjusted to the needs of the valley but on the basis of forecasts of such needs, and to plan a subsequent synchronization units in cascade . For example, this is the perspective of many MRP systems (Sinha, et. al., 2007).

In the given scenario, push strategy is located at A typical retail outlet would carry between 150 and 300 coats within a style and this is spread over 3 sizes, 5 colors, 2 or 3 fabrics and from 5 to 10 brands. SKUs with the smallest expected demand typically have both minimum and maximum quantities set at one, while the more popular SKUs would typically have a minimum quantity of 2 and a maximum quantity of 3 or 4.

The reason behind selecting this phase of the supply chain is that according to the push strategy definition, push strategy first work on the research and development issue, than moving on, production takes place and finally the marketing (Gabay, 2010). The above scenario mentioned by the author also showed that research and development regarding a specific store was done by the Pampered Puss and based on the research, the company decided to fill the outlet with different coats of style ranging from 5 to 10 fabrics. However, after placing the coats further marketing was done for the selling of the articles.

Pull Strategy

Pull means, on the contrary, an action on request. In a strictly management pull, the input of the products in production is not anticipated in respect to the orders, the production is regulated by downstream of the production process. A pull system is entirely governed by orders and therefore does not seem to require forecasts. This is actually true only for the products, however, require planning and workforce systems, ie resources that define the capacity of a process. These must also be provisioned with sufficient time to make them available at the time of use (Mooradian, et. al., 2012).

In the given scenario, Buyers build up an order quantity from forecasts of demand done at retail outlet level. This is done at SKU level, so that the actual distribution of styles, ...