PRODUCT MIX OPTIMIZATION OF FRUIT NECTAR WITH INTEGRATION OF ANALYTIC HIERARCHY PROCESS AND MATHEMATICAL PROGRAMMING

Abstract

Today, the competitiveness of companies is directly dependent on the quality and price of their products. This is because consumers have more options to buy a product than in previous years. In this study, two different mathematical models are developed to determine the best product mix according to different constraints for a fruit nectar producer. For a fruit nectar producer, 4 main and 9 sub-quality criteria were entered into the mathematical models whose importance levels were determined by the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) method. These models, created for optimum product mix, consider not only the integrated quality criteria but also different constraints such as capacity, labor, and raw material. Models aiming at breakeven and maximum profit have been run for different scenarios such as consumer demands, machine maintenance, and the increase in bottlenecks. The results have shown that the quality criteria change the production efficiency and sales quantities, and how much the existing production system can adapt if consumer demands change.