Distribution Planning of Magazines

The aim of this work is to determine the best values of total printing volume of magazines and the amounts that are sent to sales points, through forecasting and determination of optimum service level to be provided. The first part of the book deals with forecasting the sales endpoint demands for the future issue. Especially, the handling of the censored demand in case of sellout is analyzed. Also, studies are carried out for finding the optimum parameters of the forecasting method. The two main strategies used for planning are mentioned: top-down and bottom-up. The top-down approach first determines the printing volume and distributes it to the endpoints. In the second part, three alternative ways of applying the top-down approach are discussed. The third part presents the existing bottom-up optimization approach that is valid under the assumption of normal probability demand distribution. It then deduces formulas for finding return and lost sales that would occur. Then, a simulation based approach is described that finds these performance measures, under any demand distribution assumption. In the end, a computer based illustration of these methods is given.