Considering the fact that the number of students is relatively constant throughout the academic year, the college's cafeteria is planning for the second semester based of the actual sales the first semester. Month Actual Sales of Fall 2016 Forecast of Spring 2017 September 250 October 300 November 280 December 200 With the given information, can the forecast of November be obtained using a 3-month weighted moving average? Explain you answe

Considering the fact that the number of students is relatively constant throughout the academic year, the college's cafeteria is planning for the second semester based of the actual sales the first semester. Month Actual Sales of Fall 2016 Forecast of Spring 2017 September 250 October 300 November 280 December 200 With the given information, can the forecast of November be obtained using a 3-month weighted moving average? Explain you answe

Practical Management Science

6th Edition

ISBN:9781337406659

Author:WINSTON, Wayne L.

Publisher:WINSTON, Wayne L.

Chapter13: Regression And Forecasting Models

Section13.7: Exponential Smoothing Models

Problem 29P: The file P13_29.xlsx contains monthly time series data for total U.S. retail sales of building...

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Under what conditions might a firm use multiple forecasting methods?
The file P13_42.xlsx contains monthly data on consumer revolving credit (in millions of dollars) through credit unions. a. Use these data to forecast consumer revolving credit through credit unions for the next 12 months. Do it in two ways. First, fit an exponential trend to the series. Second, use Holts method with optimized smoothing constants. b. Which of these two methods appears to provide the best forecasts? Answer by comparing their MAPE values.
The Baker Company wants to develop a budget to predict how overhead costs vary with activity levels. Management is trying to decide whether direct labor hours (DLH) or units produced is the better measure of activity for the firm. Monthly data for the preceding 24 months appear in the file P13_40.xlsx. Use regression analysis to determine which measure, DLH or Units (or both), should be used for the budget. How would the regression equation be used to obtain the budget for the firms overhead costs?
The file P13_02.xlsx contains five years of monthly data on sales (number of units sold) for a particular company. The company suspects that except for random noise, its sales are growing by a constant percentage each month and will continue to do so for at least the near future. a. Explain briefly whether the plot of the series visually supports the companys suspicion. b. By what percentage are sales increasing each month? c. What is the MAPE for the forecast model in part b? In words, what does it measure? Considering its magnitude, does the model seem to be doing a good job? d. In words, how does the model make forecasts for future months? Specifically, given the forecast value for the last month in the data set, what simple arithmetic could you use to obtain forecasts for the next few months?
The owner of a restaurant in Bloomington, Indiana, has recorded sales data for the past 19 years. He has also recorded data on potentially relevant variables. The data are listed in the file P13_17.xlsx. a. Estimate a simple regression equation involving annual sales (the dependent variable) and the size of the population residing within 10 miles of the restaurant (the explanatory variable). Interpret R-square for this regression. b. Add another explanatory variableannual advertising expendituresto the regression equation in part a. Estimate and interpret this expanded equation. How does the R-square value for this multiple regression equation compare to that of the simple regression equation estimated in part a? Explain any difference between the two R-square values. How can you use the adjusted R-squares for a comparison of the two equations? c. Add one more explanatory variable to the multiple regression equation estimated in part b. In particular, estimate and interpret the coefficients of a multiple regression equation that includes the previous years advertising expenditure. How does the inclusion of this third explanatory variable affect the R-square, compared to the corresponding values for the equation of part b? Explain any changes in this value. What does the adjusted R-square for the new equation tell you?
The file P13_29.xlsx contains monthly time series data for total U.S. retail sales of building materials (which includes retail sales of building materials, hardware and garden supply stores, and mobile home dealers). a. Is seasonality present in these data? If so, characterize the seasonality pattern. b. Use Winters method to forecast this series with smoothing constants = = 0.1 and = 0.3. Does the forecast series seem to track the seasonal pattern well? What are your forecasts for the next 12 months?
The file P13_26.xlsx contains the monthly number of airline tickets sold by the CareFree Travel Agency. a. Create a time series chart of the data. Based on what you see, which of the exponential smoothing models do you think will provide the best forecasting model? Why? b. Use simple exponential smoothing to forecast these data, using a smoothing constant of 0.1. c. Repeat part b, but search for the smoothing constant that makes RMSE as small as possible. Does it make much of an improvement over the model in part b?
A manager of a store that sells and installs spas wants to prepare a forecast for January, February, and March of next year. Her forecasts are a combination of trend and seasonality. She uses the following equation to estimate the trend component of monthly demand: Ft = 70 + 5t, where t = 0 in June of last year. Seasonal relatives are 1.10 for January, 1.02 for February, and .95 for March. What demands should she predict?
The following monthly sales (in thousands of AUS dollars) of chocolate boxes have been recorded for January, February, March, and April, respectively: 8, 8, 5, 9. Focusing on sales forecast accuracy for the month of April only, explain which of the following forecasting method would you recommend: the Naïve method, the Average method, or the Simple exponential smoothing method (assuming alpha=0.8 and initial state of 7)?
It has been said that forecasting using exponential smoothing is like driving a car by looking in therear-view mirror. What are the conditions that would have to exist for driving a car that are analogous to the assumptions made when using exponential smoothing?2. What capability would an organization have to have to not need forecasts?3. When a new business is started, or a patent idea needs funding, venture capitalists or investmentbankers will want to see a business plan that includes forecast information related to a profit andloss statement. What type of forecasting information do you suppose would be required?4. Discuss how you would manage a poor forecast.5. Omar has heard from some of his customers that they will probably cut back on order sizes in thenext quarter. The company he works for has been reducing its sales force due to falling demand andhe worries that he could be next if his sales begin to fall off. Believing that he may be able to convince his customers not to cut…
Forecast is calculating estimates of future cycle/s based on data of past cycles -- there is no What? time interval in forecasting
The actual number of patients at Providence Emergency Medical Clinic for the first six weeks of this year follows: Week Actual No. of Patients 1 87 2 89 3 96 4 80 5 86 6 93 Clinic administrator Dana Schniederjans wants you to forecast patient numbers at the clinic for week 7 by using this data. You decide to use a weighted moving average method to find this forecast. Your method uses four actual demand levels, with weights of 0.333 on the present period, 0.250 one period ago, 0.250 two periods ago, and 0.167 three periods ago. Part 2 a) What is the value of your forecast? The value of the forecast is enter your response here patients (round your response to two decimal places). Part 3 b) If instead the weights were 20, 15, 15, and 10, respectively, how would the forecast change? A. The value of the forecast will increase. B. The…