The ACME company manufactured x brooms per month from

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The ACME company manufactured x brooms per month from January to April, inclusive. On the first of each month, during the following May to December, inclusive, it sold x/2 brooms. At the beginning of production on January 1st, the ACME company had no brooms in its inventory. If storage costs were $1 per month per broom, approximately how much, in terms of x, did the ACME company pay for storage from May 2nd to December 31st, inclusive?

A. $x
B. $3x
C. $4x
D. $5x
E. $14x

The OA is E.

Please, can anyone explain this PS question? I tried to solve it but I can't get the correct answer. I need your help. Thanks.
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by GMATGuruNY » Thu Jun 07, 2018 1:59 pm
swerve wrote:The ACME company manufactured x brooms per month from January to April, inclusive. On the first of each month, during the following May to December, inclusive, it sold x/2 brooms. At the beginning of production on January 1st, the ACME company had no brooms in its inventory. If storage costs were $1 per month per broom, approximately how much, in terms of x, did the ACME company pay for storage from May 2nd to December 31st, inclusive?

A. $x
B. $3x
C. $4x
D. $5x
E. $14x
Let x=2, implying that 2 brooms are manufactured each month January through April..
Since January through April = 4 months, the number of brooms manufactured = 4*2 = 8.

For the rest of the year, the number brooms sold each month = x/2 = 2/2 = 1.
Implication:
Starting in May, ACME's stock of brooms decreases by 1 every month, as follows:
May = 7 brooms.
June = 6 brooms.
July = 5 brooms.
August = 4 brooms.
September = 3 brooms.
October = 2 brooms.
November = 1 broom.
December = 0 brooms.

Since the cost for storing each broom = $1, the total cost for storing brooms May through December = 7+6+5+4+3+2+1+0 = $28.
Now plug x=2 into the answers to see which yields a total storage cost of $28.
Only E works:
14x = 14*2 = 28.

The correct answer is E.
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by Scott@TargetTestPrep » Mon May 06, 2019 7:15 pm
swerve wrote:The ACME company manufactured x brooms per month from January to April, inclusive. On the first of each month, during the following May to December, inclusive, it sold x/2 brooms. At the beginning of production on January 1st, the ACME company had no brooms in its inventory. If storage costs were $1 per month per broom, approximately how much, in terms of x, did the ACME company pay for storage from May 2nd to December 31st, inclusive?

A. $x
B. $3x
C. $4x
D. $5x
E. $14x

From January to April, the company manufactured 4x brooms. For the month of May, there are 4x - x/2 = 7x/2 brooms in the inventory. Since x/2 brooms are sold in each subsequent month, the inventories are 3x, 5x/2, 2x, 3x/2, x, x/2, and 0 for each of the months from June to December, respectively. Since each broom cost $1 storage fee per month, the company paid (7x/2 + 3x + 5x/2 + 2x + 3x/2 + x + x/2) * 1 = 14x dollars for storage fees.

Answer: E

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