The Retail Forecasting Playbook

How do forecasts affect your stores’ schedules? At what point does an inaccurate forecast ruin a schedule? How accurate are your forecasts today? These seemingly simple questions inspire fear in retailers. Most understand that forecasting is the starting point for...
The Absolute Best Way to Measure Forecast Accuracy

The Absolute Best Way to Measure Forecast Accuracy

The Absolute Best Way to Measure Forecast Accuracy Good demand forecasts are accurate demand forecasts. Today, I’m going to talk about the absolute best metric to use in the forecasting process. Let’s start with a sample demand forecast.  The following table...

Three Rules for Comparing Forecast Accuracy

Three Rules for Comparing Forecast Accuracy In the last post in the Retail Forecasting Playbook, I explained why Mean Absolute Percentage Error, or MAPE, is the best metric for measuring forecast accuracy.  In this post, I’m going to expand our focus and provide...

How to Use Special Days to Improve Forecast Accuracy

Every year, there is a lot of activity in my household before the annual Nordstrom Anniversary Sale.  It’s funny how much time my household gets planning for a department store sale, but its become an annual ritual. As crazy as I think we are, I’m always...

Five Steps to Improve Forecast Accuracy

In the last two posts in the Retail Forecasting Playbook series, I have talked about measuring forecast accuracy.  Now, let’s turn our attention to improve your forecasts. Below are five steps to help improve the accuracy of your forecasts.  This is a good process to...