Although assort packing has provided significant operational benefits, it has generated a challenge. Because manufacturers, consisting of mostly third-party original equipment manufacturing (OEM) suppliers, pack the boxes, K/S cannot request that these suppliers make all the differing box configurations (i.e., possible ways to fill a box with different items) for every article for every store. Therefore, it is common practice to restrict the number of different box configurations used per article in the packing process. That is, of the numerous possible box configurations, only a fixed number of configurations are used to distribute an article. However, the number of each item shipped to each store (i.e., the distribution amount) might not be precisely the required number. If an item is shipped to a store in an amount that is more (less) than that store’s demand, overshipment (undershipment) can result.Considering that the distribution amount depends on both packing and allocating the boxes to stores, the assort-packing decision and the distribution decision must be made simultaneously to minimize over- and undershipments. The assort-packing decision involves determining a set of box configurations that will be used in the distribution process (Table 1). The distributiondecision involves determining which box configuration and how many of each box configuration to allocate to each store (Table 2). Additionally, the demand estimation for each item in each store must be considered in advance to provide input to the assort-packing and distribution decisions. These serial decisions are collectively called streamlined assort packing and distribution (SAPD), which involves demand estimation, assortpacking, and distribution decisions. In summary, for each article, K/S seeks to find the answers to the following three SAPD questions