Putting Harvey Industries Back into the Black
BUS 644: Operations Management

Introduction
Harvey Industries is a Wisconsin based company specializing in the manufacturing of high pressure washer systems and the sale and/or the repair of the parts for these systems. This company has the privilege of serving outstanding companies like General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, Delta Airlines, United Postal Service, and the Shell Oil Company, but most of its businesses income is produced from the sale of the equipment used for coin operated self-service car wash systems. In the last three of four years, the company has lost money and the inventory for the business is consistently on the rise, thereby creating the unnecessary storage/inventory expenses. Finally, the company has the capability to produce and sell more than 975 different parts, of which 179 of those parts represent most of the company’s total profits. The focus of this paper is to provide the new President of the company with recommendations that will encourage a better inventory control system as well as a more productive supply chain managements system.
Viable Solutions to the Problems of Harvey Industries Harvey Industries must embrace the fact that “inventory effectiveness is a critical element for success” and it helps to “manage inventory so that the greatest return on the earning is achieved with the least amount of inventory investment” (Anonymous, 1998). Further, it is essential that the company be aware of the purpose of the products, which of the products have an appeal both internally and externally, and which type of inventory is needed to make the product successful (Stevenson, 2011). The types of inventories include but are not limited to: raw materials, work in progress, finished goods, resale goods, and spare parts for sale, returned or reworked goods, and idle capital goods. It