Ed Silver Dog Food Company wishes to introduce a new brand of dog biscuits composed of chicken and liver-flavored biscuits that meet certain nutritional requirements. The liver-flavored biscuits contain 1 unit of nutrient A and 2 units of nutrient B; the chicken-flavored biscuits contain 1 unit of nutrient A and 4 units of nutrient B. According to federal requirements, there must be at least 40 un its of nutrient A and 60 units of nutrient B in a package of the new mix. In addition, the company has decided that there can be no more than 15 liver-flavored biscuits in a package. If it costs 1ϕ to make 1 liver-flavored biscuit and 2ϕ to make 1 chicken-flavored, what is the optimal product mix for a package of the biscuits to minimize the firm’s costs?
(a) Formulate this as a linear programming problem.
(b) Solve this problem graphically, giving the optimal values of all variables.
(c) What is the total cost of a package of dog biscuits using the optimal mix?