A Computer-based Training Aid for Wholesale Management

The widespread availability of low-priced, powerful microcomputers has begun to have a dramatic impact on both the development and application of simulation games used in management training. In the retail trades where there is a long tradition of games usage, manual games such as the retail inventory management games Outlet and Shoprofit are increasingly coming under pressure from computer-based packages including Co-op, Supermarket, Stockshow and Supertrain. In contrast the use of games packages by wholesale firms specific to any section of their own business is virtually unknown. In fact as far as we are aware there have been no such games available in the UK till now. In this article, we describe a new game WHOLETRAIN developed between UMIST and Makro for use in wholesale (cash and carry) junior management and supervisory training.