Abstract
Product category management (PCM) plays a pivotal role in today's large stores. PCM manages to answer questions such as assortment planning (AP) and shelf space allocation (SSA). AP problem seeks to determine a list of products and suppliers, while SSA problem tries to design the layout of the selected products in the available shelf space. These problems aim to maximize the retailer sales under different constraints, such as limited purchasing budget, limited space of classes for displaying the products, and having at least a certain number of suppliers. This paper makes an attempt to develop an integrated mathematical model to optimize integrated AP, SSA, and inventory control problem for the perishable products. The objective of the model is to maximize the sales and retail profit, considering the costs of supplier contracting/selecting and ordering, assortment planning, holding, and procurement cost. GAMS BARON solver is hired to solve the proposed model in small and medium scales. However, because the problem is NP-hard, an evolutionary genetic algorithm (GA), and an efficient local search vibration damping optimization (VDO) algorithm are proposed. A real case study is considered to evaluate the effectiveness and capabilities of the model. Besides, some test problems of different sizes are generated and solved by the proposed metaheuristic solvers to confirm the efficient performance of proposed algorithms in solving large-scale instances.
Highlights
Assortment planning (AP), inventory management, and shelf-space allocation are the most basic duties in retailing
After tuning the parameters of the metaheuristic algorithms, we solved some small-sized test problems by the genetic algorithm (GA) and vibration-damping optimization (VDO) algorithms to explore the results of the initial chromosome and compare the relative percentage difference
We considered a retailing problem seeking for maximizing its profit from the sales of the principal or substituting products
Summary
Assortment planning (AP), inventory management, and shelf-space allocation are the most basic duties in retailing. Retailers have to decide on the set of products to carry in their assortment, the amount of inventory to stock for each product, and the amount of shelf-space dedicated to each product They determine these variables such that their sales or total revenue is maximized under a limited purchasing budget, limited holding space, limited space for displaying the products, and other miscellaneous constraints like having at least two suppliers for each product [1].
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
