Case Studies

Sixteen real decisions behind Volume II, told from the published record.

Every chapter of Volume II carries an In Practice case: a real organization that took a decision of the chapter's kind, told from its published record. Each case sets out the decision, the method, the result and what it took to make it work, then what Meridian, the book's case company, takes from it and four questions for a board.

The cards give a preview. The full two-page case is in the chapter, after its Worked Example and before its AXIOM Lab.

16 organizations · 15 sectors · 4 Franz Edelman Awards · 1 INFORMS Wagner Prize

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1 of 16 cases

Chapter 2Enterprise Optimization Foundations
The General Enterprise Optimization Problem Revisited
Kellogg
Kellogg Declares Its Cereal Network
An estimated $4.5 million saved in 1995
Consumer goodsWeek 8
In 1999 Kellogg, then the world's largest cereal producer, sold nearly $7 billion worldwide and coordinated more than 600 cereal stock-keeping units across about 27 plants, co-packers and distribution centers. Its planning system, a large linear program run week by week and month by month, cut costs by an estimated $4.5 million in 1995 and showed that simply closing a little-used line would leave too little capacity. What does it take to declare a whole supply network to a model?
Read the case in Chapter 2 →Lab →

Company and organization names identify the organizations whose published decisions the cases discuss. They are trademarks of their respective owners; no affiliation with or endorsement by them is implied.

Kellogg Declares Its Cereal Network