Question:Santa Cruz Bottling is a manufacturer of organic soft drinks on the coast of central California. Its products are enjoying a growing reputation and increased demand throughout the American Southwest. Because of the high cost of transporting soft drinks, it is considering a new plant to serve the states of New Mexico and Arizona. A key concern in its search for a new location is the resultant transportation costs to serve its key markets. Following is a list of cities where its main wholesale customers are located, along with estimated annual demand in cases of product for each.
City | x-coordinate | y-coordinate | No. of cases |
Phoenix | 250 | 250 | 25,000 |
Tucson | 350 | 125 | 20,000 |
Albuquerque | 800 | 450 | 28,000 |
Santa Fe | 850 | 520 | 17,000 |
a. Use the centroid method to recommend a location for the new bottling plant. Round your coordinates to one decimal place.
b. Do you have any concerns about the result? How would you deal with them?