Question

In the book of Genesis, we see that God directed Joseph to save for the future. The Lord gave Joseph the interpretation to Pharaoh’s dream. There would be seven good years followed by seven years of famine. Joseph advised gathering all the excess grain that would be harvested during the good years to be able to carry the entire nation of Egypt through the seven years of famine. How can you apply what we have learned about inventory in this topic to this biblical story?

Answer 1

When the seven years of good harvests came, Joseph developed a stockpiling system to store the grain for use during the coming drought. When the seven years of drought arrived, Joseph opened the storehouses and provided enough food to bring the nation through the famine. His wise strategy, discernment and effective implementation of the plan even allowed Egypt to supply grain to the rest of the world during the famine.

Joseph’s plan was based on locating warehouses and distribution centers in every Egyptian city. Over a 14-year year time span, he planned to balance production and consumption rates using a long-term SOP process, so that the supply chain would perform continuously and demand would be satisfied without stock-outs. Joseph had also an at-risk component as part of his package that explains Joseph’s reluctance to use pure economic order quantity principles or lean inventory principles. Instead, he simply reduced the chance of a stock-out something very familiar to parts suppliers today.

The scheme worked very well and during the famine years, Egyptians did not suffer but prospered.  International sales territories were set and global supply chains were even established with foreign countries. Joseph used his market position as a sole supplier to perform several acquisitions that solidified the competitive position of Egypt. The next phase of Joseph’s strategic vision involved an aggressive asset purchase followed by a forceful acquisition strategy.