The capacitated multi-echelon inventory system with serial structure. 1. The 'push ahead'-effect

This paper considers a multi-echelon, periodic review inventory model with discrete demand. We assume finite capacities on various production/order sizes and backordering of excess demand. We show that under the average cost criterion the optimal order strategy may be characterized by a so-called 'push ahead'-effect. Further we shall find that a modified base-stock policy approximates the optimal policy quite well