mb1 wrote:demoncase wrote:
Let's do a little maths on to understand why it's so difficult to give people a 'pick-your-own-combo'
2 factors you can pick from on one model: Blade steel and handle colour-
Let's say there are 3 steels to choose from and 5 handle colours- reasonable right?
That's 2^8 combinations- or 256 different variants you have to have in stock- for ONE model.
Now you add plain edge, combo and full spyder edge and it's 768 :eek: .... (That's making the big assumption every steel works well in a serrated edge- and they don't)
This really isn't worth debating per se, but I like math problems and need a little diversion right now.
Mr Case, Sir, I believe you may be over-mathing this one. I think you're using permutation math there (??), and in permutations order matters, correct? In this case order doesn't matter, so you would have to discount the redundancies.
Looking at it logically:
Steel 1: 5 color choices = 5
Steel 2: 5 color choices = 5
Steel 3: 5 color choices = 5
Total? = 15
I believe it's that simple here. I sure can't find a way to stock more than 15 knives with those 2 choices, and my boss says it has to be done by tomorrow!!
Mark
Doh....You're right- over-mathed it
However- 15 iterations of with a normal distribution of popularity means there's going to be 2-3 of those that gather dust, and some that fly out the door....It's bad enough (I'm sure) with a mere 2 colours with the same blade steel to manage in stock.
What do you do then for the unpopular few from that 15?- Strip 'em down and replace the scales/blade to push them back into a more popular variant?
The profit margin drops as you're having to factor in the waste of the replaced steel/scales, plus the time to make more, plus the time to pull down the stock and rebuild it to the more 'popular' spec.
And with all that you have to have a line to do this kind of work- an 'internal rework process' which by definition is non-value-added.
Car companies can absorb these iterations and combinations for three reasons
1. They run a 'Just In Time' flow-line with single piece flow- with next-to-no stock. What you ask for gets built live on the line to order
2. When you're selling a car for $20,000 retail, small iterative variations have a small overall impact on the cost:profit ratio of the sold product
3. The size of the businesses doing this are huge multinationals with a massive 'footprint' of sub-contracted outsource sub-assembly providers- You can get the variant bits easily.
When that's now a knife with a $100 street price and you want to do the same thing?....well, you're going to start making a loss on each unit fast.
Warhammer 40000 is- basically- Lord Of The Rings on a cocktail of every drug known to man and genuine lunar dust, stuck in a blender with Alien, Mechwarrior, Dune, Starship Troopers, Fahrenheit 451 and Star Wars, bathed in blood, turned up to eleventy billion, set on fire, and catapulted off into space screaming "WAAAGH!" and waving a chainsaw sword- without the happy ending.
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