If you have seen my PowerPoint file posted on our discussion board, you might remember my claim about the damper model - it might repress the fluctuation of YOUR inventory REGARDLESS of the others' behaviors. I tested it and here's the result:

Consumer Demand: Random in [0, 16]
Ordering Policy: The "Spring-Only" model (simply target at a certain inventory level).
The sensitivity coefficient is random in [0, 1), so the system is now even noisier than ever.

First, let's see what happens if everybody follows this so-so ordering policy:

As you can see, the distributor and the factory are suffering from huge fluctuations.

Now, suppose you are the owner of the factory. You tell the retailer, wholesaler and distributor that we should cooperate to reduce the overall cost. They don't listen. So, you decide to follow the "dampered spring" policy by yourself. Can you save your own factory? Let's see...

It worked. Great.

Likewise, you are the distributor and the others won't cooperate, so you use the damped-spring policy:

Again, you are the happy one. But it's also helping the factory as well.