Mixture & Alligation · Topic 6 of 6

🍊 Perishable Goods & Mixed Bag

3 exam question types, fully solved

The mixture idea also drives a family of profit-and-loss questions: perishable stock that partly spoils, sellers who cheat on weight, and batches bought at different prices. They all reduce to a weighted average.

Spoiled stock, faulty weights & batches

• Perishable goods: spoiled items still cost money but earn nothing, so the survivors must carry extra markup. Take 100 items at ₹1 (total CP ₹100); for an overall profit of the stock must fetch ₹. Divide that by the number of GOOD items to get each selling price, then the markup.

• Dishonest dealer: compare cost and price for the SAME real weight. Use a 1000 g base, find the actual CP of what is handed over and the SP actually charged, then .

• Batches: total cost and total quantity give the mean CP; the target SP for a desired profit is mean CP .

🪤Dishonest DealerSells at cost price, cheats on weight

true weight (g)

weight he gives (g)

He gives 800 g but charges for 1000 g. Gain% = error ÷ (weight given) × 100 = (1000 − 800) ÷ 800 × 100

Gain = 25%

100 items at ₹1; 20% rot; for a 20% overall profit the stock must earn ₹120 over 80 good items = ₹1.50 each, a markup of .

Q1A trader buys fruit; 20% rots. He wants 20% overall profit. The markup on each good item is:

Q2A dealer sells at cost price but uses a 900 g weight for 1 kg. His profit percent is about:

Q3A grocer buys 40 kg at ₹25/kg and 60 kg at ₹20/kg. To gain 10%, the selling price per kg is:

📚

Real exam questions — Perishable Goods & Mixed Bag

3 question types · 9 solved examples from real SSC papers

Spoiled stock still costs money, so the survivors must carry extra markup. Dishonest-dealer sums just compare cost and price for the same real weight.

How to solve this type

Anchor on a round total. Take 100 items at ₹1 each, so total CP

=

₹100. For an overall profit of

p\%

, the whole stock must fetch ₹

(100+p)

. Only the un-spoiled items actually sell, so divide that target revenue by the number of GOOD items to get the selling price each. The markup is that price compared with the ₹1 cost. The spoiled items are paid for but bring nothing, so the good ones must carry extra.

A trader buys perishable items; 30% go bad. He sells the rest to earn 19% overall profit. At what percent above cost did he sell each good item?

A75%B70%C63%D49%

A trader buys items; 15% go bad. He sells the rest and earns 19% overall profit. At what percent above cost did each good item sell?

A42%B40%C36%D34%

A medical store buys medicines worth ₹18,000 and sells 2/5 of them at a 35% loss. To break even overall, what gain percent is needed on the rest?

A20⅓%B23⅔%C23⅓%D20⅔%