EXPERIMENTS TO DETERMINE THE SIMULATED ANNEALING PARAMETERS CASE STUDY IN VRP

In this paper we describe the distribution problems faced by one of the largest retailers in the distribution and sale of fast moving consumer goods in the U.K. The paper describes an initial solution method, which is then improved by a novel form of simulated annealing. A computational experiment for the improvement algorithm has been also carried out in order to illustrate the flexibility of the computer programming and to demonstrate how it can be used to address broader management issues.