Department of Industrial Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.
PLoS One. 2024 Jun 14;19(6):e0304808. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0304808. eCollection 2024.
The efficiency and responsiveness of supply chains are vitally dependent on inventory replenishment and transportation decisions. In this paper, we study a supply chain consisting of a single retailer ordering seasonal products within the newsvendor framework. The primary objective of the paper is to investigate the retailer's decision-making process, aimed at determining the optimal replenishment quantities and selecting the appropriate mix and size of the truck fleet. Initially, we formulate a mathematical model where the retailer exclusively manages a limited fleet of its own trucks for inbound transportation of a single seasonal product. In this context, we determine a lower breakeven point for the fixed transportation cost than what has been previously proposed in the literature. Subsequently, we examine a commonly encountered transportation scenario where the retailer has the opportunity to expand its fleet size by leasing trucks from the external market. The outcomes of the numerical example indicates that the flexibility resulting from the utilization of different types of trucks can lead to reduced overall costs. We also address the practical transportation problem of efficiently shipping various seasonal products solely with the retailer's own trucks. For this complex problem, we propose an optimal solution procedure based on Lagrangian method. We show that the joint replenishment of multiple products results in cost savings and enhances utilization of the trucks' capacities.
供应链的效率和响应能力在很大程度上依赖于库存补充和运输决策。在本文中，我们研究了一个由单个零售商在报童框架内订购季节性产品的供应链。本文的主要目的是研究零售商的决策过程，旨在确定最佳补货数量，并选择合适的卡车车队组合和规模。最初，我们制定了一个数学模型，其中零售商仅管理自己的有限数量的卡车，用于单一季节性产品的入站运输。在这种情况下，我们确定了一个低于固定运输成本盈亏平衡点的点，这比文献中以前提出的要低。随后，我们研究了一种常见的运输场景，其中零售商有机会通过从外部市场租用卡车来扩大其车队规模。数值示例的结果表明，使用不同类型的卡车所带来的灵活性可以降低总体成本。我们还解决了仅使用零售商自己的卡车高效运输各种季节性产品的实际运输问题。对于这个复杂的问题，我们提出了一种基于拉格朗日方法的最优解决方案。我们表明，多个产品的联合补货可以节省成本，并提高卡车容量的利用率。
