Inventory management and control at the central distribution center for Univar Products International B.V.

This report presents the outcome of the Logistics Design Project carried out for Univar Products International B.V. The goal of this project is to design an inventory control system and implement an inventory control tool that supports decisions in managing inventory of all products in the central distribution center in order to ensure sufficient supply to RDCs with optimal costs. Factors contributing to the complexity of inventory management such as high variability in demand, high frequency of zero demand, and risk of product obsolescence have led to the proposal of a forecast based dynamic (R,Sr), f inventory control policy. In addition, the goodsflow planning and control framework is introduced. The report also shows the impact of bias on the system and the dominance of transport costs. Further analysis shows how changes in the review period impacts inventory and outbound delivery costs. The report concludes with suggestions on the reduction of bias, outbound delivery consolidation, and performance measurement.