Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Journal of the Faculty of Engineering and Architecture of Gazi University, cilt.38, sa.3, ss.1893-1906, 2023 (SCI-Expanded)
© 2023 Gazi Universitesi Muhendislik-Mimarlik. All rights reserved.This study focuses on the real-life shipping problem of a chain store facing high customer demand variability. The firm has grouped its stores according to their regions and created a distribution center (DC) for the replenishment of each store group. At regular intervals, these DCs are supplied to the stores that are affiliated with them. Currently, the firm is increasing or decreasing the number of workers in DCs to respond to the high demand volatility from stores, at the expense of very high contract costs. Despite this, the demands of the stores are not met in time and sales are lost. In this study, the problem of creating a shipment plan for DCs is discussed in order to minimize these negative effects of variability. First, the linear programming model of the problem is developed. Since the model developed for large-sized samples does not respond, two different heuristics are proposed for the solution. In the first method, called the decomposition approach, the developed model was applied separately for each store. In the second heuristic approach, the problem is handled by transforming it into a transportation model. A two-stage method was adopted for the solution. The effectiveness of the proposed solution methods is presented in a comparative way using test data of various sizes. The results show that the proposed transportation model-based approach can produce high-quality solutions to huge real-life problems in an acceptable time and without the need for any commercial solvers.