The Trapper Lawn Equipment Company manufactures a line of riding mowers. The company currently uses a chase strategy in its sales and operations planning. Management attempts to maintain a line fill rate of at least 99 percent and hold inventory of five days. Employees can produce three units a day on average. The historical records for the last three months and the plan for the next six months are given as follows:

Trapper Lawn Equipment Company Sales and Operations Planning Spreadsheet: Riding Mowers ProductGroup (Make-to-Stock)
				History				Plan
Sales			Oct	Nov	Dec	Jan	Feb	March	April	May	June
Forecast	(in million $)		12.5	10	16.25	5	5	7.5	10	12.5	17.5
	(in units)		5000	4000	6500	2000	2000	3000	4000	5000	7000
Actual	(in units)		4384	3626	6065
Diff. month			-616	-374	-435
Diff. cumulative				-990	-1425
Operations
Plan	(in units)		5000	4000	6500	2000	2000	3000	4000	5000	7000
	(in employees)		72	70	114	33	32	43	67	76	106
Number working days/mo.			23	19	19	20	21	23	20	22	22
Actual	(in units)		5649	4091	7279
Diff. month			649	91	779
Diff. cumulative				740	1519
Inventory
Plan	(in units)		1270	1270	1270	3944	3944	3944	3944	3944	3944
	(in 1000 $)		2223	2223	2223	6902	6902	6902	6902	6902	6902
Actual	(in units)		2265	2730	3944
Days of Supply			12	12	12	39	41	30	20	17	12

1. What is the selling price of a finished unit?

2. What is the cost of a unit in inventory?

3. What is the total forecasted amount (in units) for months January through June?

4. Actual inventory at end of December is 3944 units. We want to end June with an inventory of 1650 units. We will plan our operations with a level production plan (with the same number of employees every month for the six months January through June: a total of 128 work days). How many employees are needed?