The sales budget for Peyton Approved shows that the company forecasts sales to be $1,080,000 for the quarter ending September 2015. To cover the sales and the required ending inventory, the company needs to produce 60,000 units. That would require 27,380 units of raw material at a cost of $212,195. The total labor requirement is 30,000 hours at a cost of $480,000. While the budget estimate for direct material for the period is 36,320 units, the actual amount of direct labor is 31,000 units. The budgeted price per unit of direct material is $7.75. It is also the actual price. Given the difference is only on the number of units of direct material, the direct material price variance is zero. As for the direct material efficiency variance, the company records a favorable efficiency variance of $41,230. That gives a favorable total material variance of $41,230.
There was no material price variance as the budget price and the actual price were the same. As for the favorable efficiency variance, there may have been several causes. As the actual production shows, there was less direct material usage than the budget estimates. That may have been a result of efficiency in utilizing material in the production process. The procurement process may also have contributed to the favorable efficiency variance. Where there is purchase of high quality material, there would probably be no wastage and the production may use up less material than the estimates (Nobles, Mattison and Matsumura, 2014).