Title: Inventory model with seasonal demand: a specific application to haute couture

Authors: B. Joon Park; Yih-Long Chang; Johnny C. Ho

Addresses: School of Business, SIM University, 461 Clementi Road, Singapore 599491, Singapore. ' College of Management, Georgia Institute of Technology, 800 West Peachtree Street, NW Atlanta, GA 30332-0520, USA. ' D. Abbott Turner College of Business, Columbus State University, 4225 University Avenue Columbus, GA 31907-5645, USA

Abstract: In the existing body of the newsvendor literature, the duration and intervals of sales periods are given to the problem. We have learned from the haute couture industry; however, the start and finish time of seasons are an integral part of managerial discretion. The switching time decision, when to terminate the current season and to start a new season, is particularly important to haute couture because the transition from one season to next occurs virtually overnight in the high fashion industry. In this paper, we present a variation of the newsvendor model that simultaneously determines the order quantity and the intervals of sales season. The proposed model investigates the switching time and quantity decisions simultaneously. We derive the optimality conditions for the switching time and order quantity. We also illustrate the search for the optimal solutions with numerical examples. Finally, we discuss several future research topics and model extensions.

Keywords: inventory modelling; seasonal demand; newsvendor formulation; optimal policies; haute couture; high fashion; fashion industry; order quantity; sales seasons.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISM.2011.044886

International Journal of Integrated Supply Management, 2011 Vol.6 No.3/4, pp.233 - 253

Received: 24 Jun 2011
Accepted: 29 Jun 2011
Published online: 15 Jan 2012 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article