Sales Forecasting Budget and Control

* Forecasting is an impartial strategic ingredient that will ensure apt base for reputable planning. Our forecast is always the first step in developing plans in running the business along with our future plans of growth strategies. With this tool, we are able to anticipate our sales within reason that then can allow for us to control our costs in conjunction with inventory which will then help us to enhance our customer service. Sales forecasting is a vital strategic tactic in our company’s methodology.

Forecasting is the methodology utilized in the translation of past experiences in an estimation of the future. The German market presents challenges for forecasting techniques especially for its retail segment. Commercially oriented organizations are used to help during forecasting as general works done by academic scientists are not easy to come across (Bonner, 2009).

The current demand forecasting method is based on qualitative techniques more than quantitative ones. If the forecast is not accurate, the company would carry both inventory and stock out costs. It might lose customers due to shortage of supply or carry additional holding costs due to excess production. If the actual demand doesn’t match the forecast ones, and the forecast was too high, this will result in high inventories, obsolescence, asset disposals, and increased carrying costs. When a forecast is too low, the customer resorts to a competitive product or retailer. A supplier could lose both sales and shelf space at that retail location forever if their predictions continue to be inaccurate. The tolerance level of the average consumer

Before, the concept of demand forecast was to serve the key functional groups in achieving their own interest. Facing the new challenges, forecast needed to be more accurate. And therefore it needed a new concept that is to have a consensus forecasting that would accurately reveal market demand and align the needs of key actors in the forecasting process. Leitax implemented two specific changes in forecasting process. The first one is to switch the focus from sell-in to sell-through and second one is to ignore capacity constraints.

Seven models were created in order to obtain the model in which all-remaining variables are statistically significant and the final equation to predict sales is as follow:

The sales forecast is the basis for all the company’s budgets (e.g. production budgets, selling and administrative expense budgets, etc.). Understating the sales budget can have an adverse effect on the company as all the company’s budgets depend on the sales budget. Therefore, if the sales budget is understated the remaining budgets will follow suit. In the case of William George, marketing manager of Crunchy Cookie Company, understating the sales forecast is poor management style, an unethical practice, and can affect the ability to plan for future operations.

Thank you for the opportunity to assess your sales data in order to provide recommendations for increasing your sales. The analysis and recommendations below are based on the data you provided, which covers a period from May 2004 through June 2006. The analysis below is based on this data alone. Therefore, our recommendations should be tempered by your knowledge of business realities and your market. Please let us know if we can answer any questions concerning the analysis or the recommendations provided.

Moreover, the goal of any sales analysis is to isolate the pieces which comprise the entire organization to facilitate the recognition of areas that require attention (Russell, 1950). Accordingly, this deconstruction promotes comparison of financial data which allows managers, such as Lydell, to gain a stronger representation of the organization. This contributes to the management of employees and improved sales potential through the identification of areas that require supplementation or highlighting the areas that are functioning optimally (Russell, 1950). Lydell can use the internal financial records to capture data on sales history and patterns of the business. This information would give him the knowledge to gauge current sales and provide insight for recognizing positive or negative sales trends, including changes in customer habits. Lydell could also use the information regarding sales volumes and customer locations to gauge territory concentration and sales boundaries.

Forecasting demand is the art and science of predicting future demand. There are several different techniques that can be employed alone or in combination with each other, depending upon the firm’s particular situation and the point in the product’s life cycle, and they are further classified as to the time horizon they represent. Forecasts are generally quantitative (relying on historical data) or qualitative (such as variable personal experiences).

Thank you for the opportunity to assess your sales data in order to provide recommendations for increasing your sales. The analysis and recommendations below are based on the data you provided, which covers a period from May 2004 through June 2006. The analysis below is based on this data alone. Therefore, our recommendations should be tempered by your knowledge of business realities and your market. Please let us know if we can answer any questions concerning the analysis or the recommendations provided.

Based on the case, there were two fundamental changes to standardize and improve the accuracy of forecasts. The first area was to "switch the focus of the focus of the forecasting process from sell-in to sell-through". This meant tracking closely what was sold in one region and shipped from another made forecasting market demand a more accurate exercise. The second area centered on ignoring capacity constraints to estimate demand. In the past, "forecasting was affected by perceptions of present and future supply chain capacity".

Analyzing the company’s performance compared to its historical figures is always useful; nevertheless, these historical figures can be also a very useful tool to forecast future ProForma figures. We usually start by forecasting future sales (based on an average increase in sales figure) and other balance sheet and income statement items are forecasted as percentage of sales, this percent is normally consistent from historically figures. A close look should be given to the company’s operations and plan for the coming year while making our assumptions and forecasted figures. Normally we should follow

Coca-Cola is a multi-national corporation that has its headquartered in Georgia, Atlanta. The company involves itself in the business of beverage production. Subsidiary plants are located all over the world i.e. Asia, Africa, Europe, Australia and South America. Since the company has many branches and deals with a whole lot of inventory, there is a need to act proactively and timely so that there are no delays in logistics. Projections of inventory, i.e. inventory forecasting, are often done in the operations and supply chain management so that overproduction and inefficiencies are avoided. Coca-Cola also uses historic data to find out the direction of future trends (Butler, 2015). The process is used by the company to determine near accurate allocation of budgets for future production periods (Jacobs, 2013). There is a need for Coca-Cola as a company to find out the events that affect the company production wise. The occurrences include expectations of sales, and whether they will cause an increase or a decrease in the share price of the company. Nonetheless, forecasting provides a necessary benchmark for Coca-Cola, which has a long-term perspective of operations.

Business forecasting is the process of studying historical performance for the purpose of using the information gained to project future business conditions so that decisions can be made today that will assist in the achievement of certain goals. Forecasting involves taking historical date and using it to project future data with a mathematical model. Forecasts are extensively used to support business decisions and direct the work of operations managers. In this paper I will introduce different types of forecasting techniques.

But even this is not possible in case of a new product or innovation. A forecast of sales, demand, cash, requirements and several such business valuables are extremely essential for a business in order to be able to appropriately plan and conduct its operations in an effective and efficient manner. Yet, forecasts cannot be made accurately as there are several factors and changes in the current environment that leads to variations in forecasts and impacts or causes a manager to make changes in the forecasts.