Optimization of a perishable inventory system: A simulation study in a Ho.Re.Ca. company

Abstract

The main goal of this paper is to describe the optimization of the inventory management process in a real context of perishable food products. The study involves one of the largest Italian HO.RE.CA. companies, located in the north of Italy and operating as a provider of the catering, commercial and welfare services. A simulation model was set up with the purpose of adapting three traditional reordering policies (i.e. ReOrder Point, ReOrder Cycle, and (s,S)) to a set of products belonging to company's assortment and evaluating the resulting economic outcomes. To this end, each policy was modelled on Microsoft Excel TM , so as to compute the total cost of inventory management and determine of the minimum cost strategy. A comparison with the current company's performance and that achievable with the optimized policy is also proposed.