Beer Game

Player guide

How to play the Beer Game

The Beer Game (also called the beer distribution game) is a supply chain simulation developed at MIT. You manage one of four stages of a beer supply chain and make exactly one decision each simulated week: how much to order. Simple rules — and reliably chaotic results. Here is everything you need to know.

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What are the four roles in the Beer Game?

Every game has the same four-stage chain: Retailer, Wholesaler, Distributor, and Factory. Beer flows downstream toward the customer; orders flow upstream toward the factory. Each player runs one stage. Crucially, you can only see your own stage — your inventory, your backlog, and the order that just arrived from downstream. No one else's numbers, and no talking about orders.

🛒Retailer

Sells beer to the customer and is the only role that sees real consumer demand. Orders from the wholesaler.

📦Wholesaler

Supplies the retailer. Never sees the customer — only the retailer's orders. Orders from the distributor.

🚚Distributor

Supplies the wholesaler. Two steps removed from real demand, where delays start compounding. Orders from the factory.

🏭Factory

Brews the beer. Furthest from the customer, so demand signals arrive latest and most distorted. “Orders” by scheduling production.

How does a round work?

Each round is one simulated week, and every week follows the same rhythm. Receive, ship, order — that's it. The whole game is deciding one number.

  1. 1

    Choose your role

    Pick one of the four stages of the supply chain: Retailer, Wholesaler, Distributor, or Factory. You manage that stage — and only that stage — for the whole game.

  2. 2

    Receive this week's shipment

    Cases you ordered in earlier weeks arrive after the shipping delay and are added to your inventory.

  3. 3

    Check your incoming order

    See what your downstream customer wants this week. The retailer sees real customer demand; everyone else only sees the order placed by the stage below them.

  4. 4

    Ship what you can

    Fill the new order plus any backlog from your inventory. Anything you cannot fill becomes backlog — unfilled orders are never cancelled, they wait until you can ship them.

  5. 5

    Place your order

    Decide how many cases to order from your upstream supplier. This is your only decision each week — and the entire game.

  6. 6

    Pay the week's costs

    Every case sitting in inventory costs $0.50 for the week. Every case on backlog costs $1.00. Costs accumulate for all 36 weeks.

  7. 7

    Repeat for 36 weeks

    The game runs 36 simulated weeks. When it ends, the team with the lowest total cost across the whole supply chain wins.

Why do orders take so long to arrive?

Delays are the heart of the game. When you place an order, it takes one week to reach your supplier, and once they ship, the beer takes two more weeks to reach you — and that assumes your supplier has stock on hand. If they're backlogged too, you wait longer. The factory faces the same physics: brewing takes two weeks from scheduling production to beer in the warehouse.

So the cases you order today help you three or more weeks from now. Most first-time players forget what they already have on order, keep ordering while they wait, and then get buried when everything arrives at once. Keeping a mental (or literal) note of your pipeline — everything ordered but not yet delivered — is the single biggest skill in the game.

This is exactly how a small demand blip becomes an upstream tidal wave — a phenomenon called the bullwhip effect.

How do costs work?

You are squeezed from both sides, every single week:

$0.50 / case / week

Holding cost

Every case sitting in your warehouse costs money to store. Hoarding inventory “just in case” is not free.

$1.00 / case / week

Backlog cost

Every unfilled case costs twice as much — angry customers are expensive. Backorders stack up and must eventually be filled.

How do you win the Beer Game?

There is no revenue and no profit — the lowest total cost wins. And it's a team score: your result is the combined cost of all four stages over 36 weeks, so a hero performance at one stage means nothing if the rest of the chain melts down. The winning tension is holding just enough inventory to avoid backlog without paying to store a mountain of beer.

Fair warning: almost every first-time team does far worse than they expect — that's the lesson, not a failure. Well-meaning, rational people plus delays and limited information reliably produce wild swings.

Any tips for a first game?

  • Count your pipeline. Before ordering, add up everything you've ordered that hasn't arrived. It's the number most players ignore — and the one that sinks them.
  • Don't panic-order. When backlog appears, the urge is to order big. Those big orders arrive weeks later, usually after the shortage has passed, and become expensive inventory.
  • Expect the wave. If your incoming orders suddenly spike, some of that is real demand and some is downstream panic. React to the trend, not to one bad week.
  • Stay steady. Small, consistent adjustments beat dramatic corrections. The chain punishes overreaction in both directions.

Playing solo takes about 10 minutes — you pick a role and the AI runs the other three. Teaching a class or running a workshop instead? See the instructor guide.

The rules take 2 minutes. The lesson lasts.

Host your own game with a free En Dash account — or try it instantly as a guest: a full 36-week game, no setup.

Play the Beer GameHost a game

Keep going

📈

The bullwhip effect

What it is, what causes it, and why a small demand change wrecks a whole supply chain.

🎓

For instructors

Session sizes, timing, classroom setup, and debrief questions for teaching with the game.

🎯

Play the game

Reading about it only goes so far. Play a solo game as a guest in about 10 minutes.

Or head back to the Beer Game overview, or sign in to host and save games.