The present study aims at providing a solution to manufacturer and designer for selecting manufacturing cost-effective uniform ply thickness and finding necessary optimum ply angle stacking sequence when ply thicknesses and ply angles are available in discrete form, in two stages using combined variable thickness (VTA) and uniform thickness approach (UTA). The manufacturing cost is indirectly included in the analysis by restricting maximum number of layers and resizing ply thicknesses accordingly, while minimizing weight. Maximum stress theory, Tsai Wu theory, and Tsai Hill theory are used as constraints in the analysis independently. The capability of the conventional genetic algorithm is improved using direct value-coded representation for chromosomes to handle multiple design variables of different nature in discrete form, simultaneously. The effectiveness of combined VTA–UTA strategy in this regard is demonstrated with multiple examples.