A particulay brand of shirt comes in 12 colors, has a male and female version, and comes in three sizes for each sex. How many different types of this shirt are made.

c = number of colors for each shirt
s = number of gender types for each shirt
z = number of sizes for each shirt

The answer is the product of all three of these because shirt can be each of all the possibilties of each variable. Thus

Answer = c * s * z = 12 * 2 * 3 = 72 different types