Buffer Sizing, Resizing and Monitoring in TOC DBM Approach with Respect to Seasonal Products—A Simulation Study

Abstract

AbstractStock demand has different kinds of components. Irregular components are a highly unpredictable phenomenon in most manufacturing firms. And added to this, it rarely follows any distribution at all. Theory of constraints presents a simplified method to deal with random fluctuations in inventory demand called dynamic buffer management. This method also considers resizing buffers depending on other components of demand variation. This paper proposes a framework to deal with seasonal fluctuations in demand using the dynamic buffer management. Most current methods use highly mathematical models to deal with the stocks and safety stocks when dealing with seasonal demand patterns. This makes computations cumbersome and difficult to understand for most people. Another difficulty is setting policies for complex mathematical models which can be executed in the workplace with ease. On these counts, the model presented in this paper comes up with the answers to the problem, whilst maintaining the simplicity of policy-based implementation.KeywordsDynamic buffer managementDemandLead timeSeasonal variationZones of inventorySeasonsOrdering frequencyLead time