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set of circumstances very rarely exists. The typical situation is that the problems mentioned above of over reaction and bias to having inventory physically in view, overwhelm all other considerations. I have observed time and time again cases of local management overriding perfectly fine order levels on the basis of some general "gut feel" that was frankly without merit. As an example, one company created replenishment orders centrally and then sent it down to the branches for their input. Ideally, the only overrides made by local management should have been based on unique local circumstances (e.g., we are running a special flyer in the local newspaper next month and we better inflate our reorder of those items). Instead, the replenishment orders routinely came back with each item crossed out and replaced by something higher. When asked for the rational for the changes, the comment was, "Oh, they just seemed a bit low." Unfortunately this is typical, and in this case represented the inability of local management to realize that they had more effective inventory than met the eye. It was actually in the pipeline and in the central warehouse as a backup as well. Centralizing inventory management would normally make me nervous if the software driving the replenishment order was less than adequate. With a weak system driving the inventory status, there will be innumerable questionable situations arise, and very possibly a drop in fill rates. Local management will then react very negatively and a total collapse of the system can take place. MARS-IW frankly has the power and features to insure that the centrally created orders make sense, and that fill rates are maintained, if not improved. This does not mean that local management will not be extremely wary of the system. First of all, their control has been taken away, and then finally the level of inventories will drop below their previous comfort levels. Nevertheless, with time, this lack of comfort should settle down once the favorable results become apparent. Centralized purchasing and ordering has the added benefit that the company can invest in more highly trained purchasing and inventory management people. It is also more economical to train people, plus the potential for turnover is lower. One final side benefit with central control is the ability to more effectively study special buy considerations and other economic trade-offs. The discount analysis features of MARS-IW permit this kind of analysis, but unless the data is being looked at centrally, it is impossible to adequately optimize company decisions. Recommendation My final recommendation is to manage inventories centrally supported with a powerful software system such as MARS-IW. Additionally, there should be a mechanism by which local management can, on an exception basis, offer input regarding local events. This mechanism should however, insure that any overrides be based on bona fide situations that the central planner has no knowledge off.