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A-Level Business: Sales Forecasting, How Many Tubs for Next Summer?

Students calculate four-quarter centred moving averages for an ice cream maker, extrapolate the trend, read a scatter graph of sales against temperature and judge how far to trust the forecast before ordering summer stock.

A Level Business · Edexcel 9BS0, Theme 3 · Free PDF and Word · No sign up

Illustration of a seaside ice cream counter with stacked tubs labelled Shingle Cove Ices and a chalkboard asking how many tubs to order for next summer — Illustration created with an AI image tool to show the situation. All figures are those used in the lesson.

A-Level-Business-Sales-Forecasting-Ice-Cream-Student

Student pages. 7 pages: the case, the tasks, charts and space for working. No answers.

Student PDF Student Word

A-Level-Business-Sales-Forecasting-Ice-Cream-Teacher

Teacher guide. 5 pages: lesson plan, worked answers, a completed trend chart and indicative guidance for the written decision.

Teacher PDF Teacher Word

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Edexcel A level Business, Theme 3: all 24 lessons for £13, about 54p a lesson. Eight original cases with learner pages, a teacher guide and full worked answers, as PDF and editable Word.

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Original cases, not exam board questions. Not endorsed by any exam board.

The first student pages of Sales Forecasting: How Many Tubs for Next Summer?

What students do

Read two years of quarterly ice cream sales and spot the seasonal pattern
Calculate four-quarter moving totals and centred moving averages
Plot the trend, draw a line of best fit and extrapolate it to next summer
Read a scatter graph of weekly sales against temperature, sort the limitations of the forecast with a partner and advise the owner which order to place

What the teacher gets

A lesson plan for about 55 minutes of tasks, with a shorter 45-minute version. Allow longer in the timetable for handing out and feedback
Worked answers for every calculation, a completed trend chart and the accepted ranges for graph readings
Indicative guidance for the written decision. It is not an exam board mark scheme and carries no marks or grades
Editable Word versions of both files, so you can change the business or the figures

Specification

Edexcel A level Business (9BS0), Theme 3, section 3.3.1 Quantitative sales forecasting: moving averages (three period/four quarter), interpreting scatter graphs and a line of best fit, extrapolation of past data to future, and the limitations of quantitative sales forecasting techniques. Checked against the Pearson specification, Issue 1, September 2014. The business and every figure are fictional and the questions are original. This is not a Pearson resource, and the lesson has not yet been tested in a classroom.

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Three full lessons on forecasting and investment: Thistledown Garden Centre pack.