Fashion Supply Chain Optimization: A Linear Programming Model

Abstract

Fashion supply chain management is challenging due to demand uncertainty, short product life cycle, fierce global competition, increasing expectations for diversity in production, and keeping pace with the current and emerging trends. In this paper, a brief review of the published works in the field of fashion and clothing supply chain is presented and an integrated linear model is developed to minimize the costs of a fashion brand, including production and logistics costs, enabling the firm to make better decisions with regard to its production and replenishment policies and to respond in a reasonable time to customers demands for various designed items. We show that our model can successfully account for the complex structure of the supply chain consisting of designers, manufacturers, distributors, and stores. The model is validated using the General Algebraic Modeling System (GAMS) with the data collected from an Iranian fashion brand.