Real-Life Math
You are a shoe designer for one of the world's leading athletic
shoe companies. Your years of training in industrial design are finally paying
off -- you are one of the most popular designers in your industry.
A few of your designs were so popular that they helped your company double
its revenue over the past few years.
You are now responsible for leading
a team to design a new athletic shoe for the upcoming summer. After the market
researchers have completed their analysis, you try to update yourself and
the team with the most current market conditions, and try to predict potential
shifts in consumer trends. You sit in the conference room with your colleagues
and start brainstorming.
After spending many sleepless nights in the
conference room, your team has finally come up with the most innovative and
promising design for this summer. This is where your math skills come in handy.
"The
profession is a mixture of many elements from engineering, materials and processes,
human factors, business, strategic planning, art and design," says Dave Schenone,
who is in charge of design at an athletic shoe company. "However, math is
a big part of a designer's life, specifically in [the] documentation of the
final design direction for prototyping ideas, or preparation for production."
To
complete your project, you must calculate the approximate cost for producing
a pair of runners. Your calculation should include material costs, labor costs
and shipping costs.
Given:
- Labor: $7 an hour
- Materials:
- Shoelace: $0.30 per shoe
- Leather: $8 per shoe
- Rubber: $3.50 per shoe
- Insoles: $1.15 per shoe
- All others: $2.75 per shoe
- Shipping: $2.50 per shoe
To make 1 shoe takes about 1.5 hours. Since costs are
given per shoe, you must remember to double the costs, since you want to calculate
the manufacturing cost for a pair of shoes.