Question

A cereal company is creating new boxes for its product. In order to display the boxes, the stores they sell to require that the boxes be 11.5 inches high and no longer than 8.4 inches. The printing department requires exactly 272.8 square inches of space in order to use the planned design that covers the box. If the company wishes to maximize the length of the box, then what should be the width of the box?

Answer 1

If the problem says "space", that usually means that they are talking about volume. The maximum length the box can be is 8.4 inches. To find volume, you do length * width * height. You know the length and height, as well as the volume. You can replace the width with "x". Your equation should be:

11.5 * 8.4 * x = 272.8

Then you can just solve for x by dividing both sides by (11.5 * 8.4). The answer should be about 2.82 inches.