Using MRP and JIT Techniques for Smart Procurement and Operations of a Restaurant

Abstract

Organisations in the hospitality sector face problems in meeting customers’ demands of food items within an expected time and cost. However, some materials planning and procurement techniques may help process food items within acceptable lead times. The organisation needs to know what and how much it has on hand and what and how much to purchase from external sources. This paper applied the MRP and JIT concepts in a medium-sized restaurant named that creates various types of food items using raw materials from local and overseas sources. The paper has used actual data over ten weeks of sales of the most popular food items to forecast future demand using a moving average forecasting model. By using the forecast of end products and other information (viz. product structure, bill of materials, inventory on hand, lead-time), an MRP spreadsheet for various raw materials was generated, which would be supplied using the JIT scheduling to meet current and future customer demands within the expected time and at the lowest cost.