Exercise 8.8 “Consider the weekly thermostat sales in Figure 8.7(b)” Data are in table 8.1 (p. 359) and can be found on the CDROM, e.g. as a Minitab Worksheet:
Weekly data (52 weeks). Seasonal variation? Could be if the sales depend on the weekday. Not reasonable for this type of good. (Figure out if there are other types of goods whose sales figures depend on the weekday) Here: Data possess a trend but no seasonal variation Use Holt’s method for forecasting.
“a. Using the first 52 weeks of sales (that is, use T = 52), find the point forecast and 95% prediction interval för sales in week 56. b. Using the first 52 weeks of sales, find the point forecast and 95% prediction interval för sales in week 57. The trend seems to be a bit less stable while there are no obvious level shifts Gives forecasts for weeks 53, 54, 55, 56 and 57 of which the last two were asked for.
Double Exponential Smoothing for y Data y Length 52 Smoothing Constants Alpha (level) 0.2 Gamma (trend) 0.3 Accuracy Measures MAPE MAD MSD Forecasts Period Forecast Lower Upper
Alt. Let Minitab optimize the smoothing parameters Smoothing Constants Alpha (level) Gamma (trend) Accuracy Measures MAPE MAD MSD Forecasts Period Forecast Lower Upper Compare with previous