You have been chosen by your plant manager to forecast

You have been chosen by your plant manager to forecast the next years production for all four quarters. This will allow you to set production goals, a working budget, determine necessary inventory, and distribution for the next year. 

Your report should be a minimum of 8 pages, not including you works cited page. The excel workbook should have multiple worksheets labeled in different colors representing the analytical portion. 

Project Deliverables 

You will need to research the cost of steel coils (hot or cold rolled) to determine your material cost. Use only reliable sources, Wikipedia is not a reliable source. Your team must determine what a reliable source is and cite your source. 

To forecast pipe production, you will need to evaluate the raw material cost from previous years. Use at minimum 20 years of raw material cost (hot or cold rolled steel); and other variables (iron ore/ oil) or any others you think will determine demand. You may use more year’s data if you choose. HINT! – You are forecasting demand for raw material(coils). 

Once you have sufficiently forecasted the raw material cost, you will need to plan operations to facilitate the increase or decrease of production in your facility. Please use the appropriate forecast and explain why you chose that specific model. 

1. Determine if you should increase production or decrease and by how much? Based on the right forecast model. Use the past 20 years (2000- 2021) of Hot or Cold rolled steel prices at yearly interval averages to forecast cost. Specify hot or cold in your report. 
   1. Make sure to use an excel model to do your forecast. 
   2. Research independent variables that affect the price of steel coils 
   3. Use these independent variables to forecast the next year’s 

production

1. Explain the assumed relationship between the independent 

variable and dependent variable. 

1. Summarize historical errors using MAD, MSE, or MAPE 
2. Use standard error of estimate to determine how accurate your 

forecast is. 

1. Check for correlations and explain 
2. Once you have completed your forecast, determine the cost of steel coils for 2022. 

Production Analysis 

1. Once you have determined the forecasted price per ton for steel coils, you will need to determine if the forecasted cost will incentivize you to decrease or increase production. What would you increase or decrease production to? 
2. If you choose to increase production, explain why and if your budget needs to be adjusted higher or lower for coil purchases and what the final cost would be? 
3. Based on your decrease or increase determine your new yearly production. 
4. Create a shift schedule based on your new production that will have one crew(a) (workers in all production areas) on 4 days, then the Next crew(b) on for 3 days. This will be a rotating schedule of the current workforce need in each area. (Overtime is 1.5 times the hourly rate after 40 hrs.) 
5. Utilize the pay scale to determine labor cost for your forecast depending on the increase or decrease in production. 
6. Given the labor, raw material, and work shift information, determine the total cost based on your forecast. This is your forecasted budget. (I have excluded some items and simplified for this project.) 
7. What is your forecasted revenue? (Extra credit) 

Material 

1 Rolled Steel Coil = 5 tons
Current price per ton = $2118
Estimated Steel Pipe Produced from 1 coil = 10,000 pieces of pipe Current Daily Production = 1,000 pipe per day
Currently Yearly Production = 365,000 pieces
Current number of steel coils used yearly = 37
Current budget for coil purchases – $166,555,000 

Sales 

Pipe sales price = $1,800 (per unit) 

Work Schedule is as follows for CURRENT PRODUCTION 

Hours = 12hrs/ day (365 days) Workdays per week = 7 Daytime shift only 

To determine pay for employees use every two weeks’ pay structure. Start January 1st. 

For assignment purposes we assume no shutdowns or maintenance issues. 

PAY SCALE 

Supervisors pay = $45/hr. 

Crane pay = $35/hr. Operator pay = $35/hr. Inspector pay = $30/hr.
IT technician pay = $25/hr. Forklift Operator pay = $25/h Grinder/ Cutter Pay= $20/hr. Helper Pay = $15/hr. 

Areas of Production
(assume employees needed for per shift, remember there is an A & B shift) 

Slitter = 1 supervisor Operator = 1 

Helpers = 2
Crane Operator = 1 

Forming = 1 supervisor Operator = 2 

Helpers = 4 Cutter = 1 

QA/QC = 1 supervisor Inspectors = 4 

Yard = 

Helpers = 2 Grinders = 2 

1 supervisor
2 forklift operators 2 Helpers/Flaggers 

IT = 1 technician 

Supply Chain 

The storage yard at your facility currently has the capacity to hold 40 steel coils. It is important for you to maintain the appropriate amount of inventory for production. Remember assuming production is constant 365days. 

Based off your forecast, determine if you will need to increase or decrease storage capacity for your facility; then add a 20% increase in coil inventory to cover scrap and mistakes. 

Based off your forecasted demand of coils annually, determine the fixed order size. The annual holding cost is 1,000 per coil and 2,500 to process an order. (Use appropriate economic order model) How many times per year do you need to reorder? What is your total carrying and ordering cost? What is the length of your ordering cycle? 

Develop a logistics plan based the following information. Determine which route is the best route. Explain your answer and express your cost structure in an excel table. 

Assume the following:
Your location = Houston, TX
Distribution Center A = Corpus Christi, TX Distribution Center B = Fairfield, AL Distribution Center C = Chicago, IL 

Gas = $3.50/gal
Trucking mileage cost = .66 per mile Driver hourly rate = 35/ hr. 

Title Page 

Project Outline 

Project Name, Team Members First & Last Name (alphabetically listed), Class, Section Number, Class Day & time or online only. 

Introduction

In the introduction describe who you are and what your role as Operations Manager encompasses for this project. Utilize the information provided and the chapter learnings to give a complete description. This part must be done in relation to this course and what you have learned. Treat the introduction as your presentation of information to executives. Include elements of what your goals are. You may expand on the information provided. 

Operations

I provided you with questions that need to be answered in this section. Please answer the questions in report format. Do not list the answers. Formulate your responses with supported evidence and logical answers based off your analysis. You may add additional information. 

Supply Chain 

Follow the above operations instructions. 

Conclusion

You conclusion will summarize Operations and Supply Chain. To conclude organize your findings by stating what goals you expect to reach, necessary budget, and other forecasted determinates. The idea here is to have the above two separate elements come together to describe facility management for the next year based off these components. If you added anything additional remember to report here. 

Work Cited 

You must include a work sited page. APA format. Perdue Owl is acceptable. Remember, Cite, Cite, Cite! Even if form the textbook or paraphrasing. A good rule is, if it was not your original though, you must cite it properly formatted. You will turn the report in using Turnitin. Turnitin is very good at recognizing plagiarism. Please Cite all sources in your document and on works cited page. 

Evidence of plagiarism will be evaluated; accordingly, up to receiving a zero for the assignment and subject to university policy. 

Report Format & Project Submittal 

Report Format 

Follow the report format provided for you with headings. You may not exclude any portions. Us 12-point New Times Roman font and 1-inch margins. You may use a footer for page numbers of standard size. 

Your paper should be double spaced with no excessive spaces between headings. You may use subheadings or additional headings if you feel they are necessary. Use proper paragraph form 

The paper should be at least 7-8 pages long, excluding the works-cited page. Do not include unnecessary words and phrases to extend your paper. This is a business report. 

Excel

For your data analysis, please have separate worksheets of the workbook for each model, schedule, or solution. Name each worksheet and have it color coded.