Quick! How many cough drops will your family need this winter?

Don't know?

Then, how about this question: how many cough drops will the entire population of the United States need this winter?

Stumped again? If you are, it's not surprising. That's a VERY complicated question!

But it's a question that Barbara Hesford thinks about all the time. Barbara is the Master Production Scheduler (USA) for Pfizer Adams. Pfizer Adams, which is located in the United Kingdom, is the maker of Hall's Mentholyptus cough drops and other Hall's products.

As Master Production Scheduler, it is Barbara's job to figure out exactly how many of those cough drops people in the USA will need. Once Barbara figures out how many Hall's cough drops are needed, she must work with her colleagues to get those cough drops delivered in time.

Barbara works with Pfizer Adams' production plant to make sure that just the right amount of Hall's Mentholyptus cough drops are made. And then she works with the staff people in the shipping department to make sure that the cough drops make it safely across the Atlantic Ocean from the United Kingdom to the United States. (The Boomerang Box is currently carrying a load of Hall's Mentholyptus cough drops because of Barbara's work!)

You can imagine that Barbara has to be pretty careful in her work.

If she arranges to make too many cough drops, they won't all be sold. And that will be expensive for Pfizer Adams. How would you like to make something and then pay to ship it halfway around the world only to find out it isn't needed?

But, on the other hand, if Barbara arranges to make too few cough drops, there won't be enough to go around during cold and flu season. And that will make customers in the US very unhappy.

So Barbara tries hard to get the number just right. She's gotten very good at it. So good, in fact, that this summer she was given a brand new challenge!

Hall's decided to produce a new product called Fruit Breezers. Fruit Breezers also help soothe sore throats, but they do not contain Mentholyptus. Instead, they come in many different flavors, and have a wild, striped look.

Now, we said that Barbara's gotten pretty good at predicting how many Hall's Mentholyptus cough drops people in the US will need each winter. But part of her success is due to the fact that she knows how many cough drops they used last year!

With the Fruit Breezers, she had a whole new challenge. How could you predict the number of Fruit Breezers that would be needed, when they had never existed before?

What do you think Barbara did?

Well, she used everything she has learned over the last few years about the cough drop needs of people in the US to predict how many Fruit Breezers people would want. Then, she shared this information with her colleagues. Fruit Breezers recently arrived in the United States, all ready for the cold weather and sore throats!