ABC classifications are commonly used to streamline a large number of SKUs into fewer, more manageable categories. As Aris, John, and Ruud explain, this classification may be useful for inventory control, but it does not provide much help in the selection of appropriate forecasting methods. The...

Forecasting seasonal products can be difficult when the products are fairly new or highly variable. The Spring 2007 issue of Foresight contained a special feature on modeling seasonality in short time series. The articles addressed the issues of minimum sample size requirements and surveyed the...

Forecasting by temporal aggregation is the process of aggregating demands from higher-frequency to lower-frequency time buckets Ð for example, aggregating daily data to weekly Ð and using the aggregate time series to generate forecasts. This intuitively appealing approach will almost always...

John and Aris distinguish between forecase-accuracy metrics, which measure the errors resulting from a forecast method, and accuracy-implication metrics, which measure the achievement of the organization's stockholding and service-level goals. Both measurements are important. The correct choice...