Bindley Corporation has a one-year contract to supply motors for all washing machines produced by Rinso

Bindley Corporation has a one-year contract to supply motors for all washing machines produced by Rinso Ltd. Rinso manufactures the washers at four locations around the country:

New York, Fort Worth, San Diego, and Minneapolis. Plans call for the following numbers of washing machines to be produced at each location:

New York

50,000

Fort Worth

70,000

San Diego

60,000

Minneapolis

80,000

Bindley has three plants that can produce the motors. The plants and production capacities are

Boulder

100,000

Macon

100,000

Gary

150,000

Due to varying production and transportation costs, the profit Bindley earns on each 1,000 units depends on where they were produced and where they were shipped. The following table gives the accounting department estimates of the dollar profit per unit. (Shipment will be made in lots of 1,000.)



Shipped to



Produced at

New York

Fort Worth

San Diego

Minneapolis

Boulder

7

11

8

13

Macon

20

17

12

10

Gary

8

18

13

16

Given profit maximization as a criterion, Bindley would like to determine how many motors should be produced at each plant and how many motors should be shipped from each plant to each destination.

a. Develop a transportation grid for this problem.

b. Find the optimal solution using Microsoft Excel.