Use POS Information to Address the What, Why, and How

USe pOS infOrMaTiOn TO addreSS THe WHaT, WHy, and HOW By larry lapide, ph.d. (This is an ongoing column in The Journal, which is intended to give a brief view on a potential topic of interest to practitioners of business forecasting. Suggestions on topics that you would like to see covered should be sent via email to llapide@ mit.edu). I I was pleased to be asked by Professor Chaman Jain to write about the usefulness of Point of Sales (POS) information in this special issue of the Journal of Business Forecasting (JBF), which is dedicated to the topic. I have been bullish over the years on the useful ways to leverage downstream data. I have been defining this data to not only include store-level POS data in the traditional sense—such as that provided to suppliers by retailers such as Wal-Mart and obtained from scanning merchandize at store registers—but also distributor and retailer warehouse withdrawals and inventories. This is my first opportunity to also discuss the usefulness of third-party syndicated data from such companies as IRI and Nielsen. These companies not only provide a company with data about a supplier’s POS sales, but also about its market share against ...