Landhills Winery: Developing an Optimal Blending Plan

Description

A senior vintner at Landhills Winery (Landhills) has been put in charge of developing an optimal blending plan for the upcoming season. This assignment is the result of a recent Landhills board meeting where the chief executive officer presented her ideas regarding the use of analytics for enhancing profits while at the same time not affecting quality. Specifically, the use of resource optimization could significantly improve Landhills’s profitability. Industry reports have indicated that a growing number of major wineries are using analytics to assist in the wine-blending process. The board meeting concluded with the CEO tasking the senior vintner with developing an analysis and reporting back his findings to the board at next month’s meeting.

Learning Objective

This case can be used in a core decision sciences or operations management graduate-level course. It focuses on the use of linear programming to develop an optimal production plan. Students are to develop a linear model in Microsoft Excel and solve the model to determine the optimal production. Furthermore, sensitivity analysis needs to be performed to answer various production questions. The case learning objectives include the following: ·To appreciate how blended wines are produced. ·To understand how linear programming can be used to develop an optimal blending mix. ·To use Excel for developing a linear programming case solution.To conduct sensitivity analysis on key model variables.

Keywords

Analytics United States wine blending