Prepare a forecast through week 11 by using a five-week moving average
A rental car manager estimates the number of full-size sedans rented per week so that she can maintain an adequate number of cars in the lot. Data for the past 10 weeks are shown here:
Week Rentals Week Rentals
1 23 6 28
2 24 7 32
3 32 8 35
4 26 9 26
5 31 10 24
a) Prepare a forecast through week 11 by using a five-week moving average.
b) Prepare a forecast through week 11 by using a 3-period weighted moving average, giving the weight of 0.5 to the most recent week, 0.3 to the second week and 0.2 to the third week.
c) Prepare a forecast using exponential smoothing method with α = 0.2. Forecast for week 1 was 22.
d) Prepare a forecast through week 11 by using a regression model Y= 26.33 + 0.3212X
e) Which method is preferred for this data if mean absolute deviation (MAD) is used?
f) Make a recommendation for the number of full-size sedans for a week.
