Last week I got the opportunity to present to the Oracle Retail User Group on the topic of Managing by Exception in Oracle Retail Demand Forecasting (RDF). The one topic that seemed to resonate the most in this area was the concept of using what I referred to as a Master Alert.

The premise behind the Master Alert is based on these principles:

1. One alert/exception rule that combines all other key rules/exceptions
2. The ability for a user to easily turn on and off which rules/exceptions are used in this master alert
3. The ability to control the frequency of when the alert will next need to be checked
4. The ability to sort/rank the product/location level forecasted by a key magnitude metric

Before I dig in, it’s important to note that I use exception and alert interchangeably to mean some type of defined rule or check that then produces a flag or notification within the system to pinpoint the user to troubled and/or out-of-tolerance occurrences. So yes, let’s dig in.

Those in retail that forecast/plan their business down at the Item/Store or SKU/Store level know that there are by far too many combinations for even a well staffed forecasting organization to review each forecast on a regular basis. In the good old days, when Ms. Pac-man was considered to have amazing graphics and forecasting systems ran on less disk space than that found on today’s iPod, the decision was made easy for us; forecast and manage our products at rolled-up/aggregate levels along the product or location hierarchy. And even at these aggregate levels with checks and balances in place to review and manage the profiles and forecasts, it still could be an overwhelming task. Read the rest of the article »

Welcome to the retail forecasting blog. 

You’re probably here because you know how tough it can be to generate consistently good demand forecasts in retail.

If you’re looking for help or ideas, you’ve come to the right place.  

We’ve worked in retail forecasting for many years. During that time we’ve developed a solid network of smart people whose ideas and experience have increased our knowledge and improved our skills.

If our own limited network has been so useful to us so far, we imagine we can all benefit even more if we can engage the entire retail forecasting community.  

This blog is our attempt to do just that. We hope to provide a forum where people who are interested in the challenges and techniques of retail forecasting can share thoughts, ideas and experience.

If you work with any aspect of retail forecasting (business, IT, systems, organization, etc.), we hope you will find content of value to you here. We’ll share best practices, lessons learned, useful tricks, and anything else we feel can make your work better. We’ll try to post at least one new entry each week.

We hope you, in turn, will feel welcome to provide your thoughts and feedback. Let us know what topics interest you. The success of this blog will depend on you and your contributions to it. 

We’ll moderate the blog and all comments to ensure the quality of its content.

Thanks for coming, and please feel welcome to come again.

–The retail forecasting blog team.