Demand planning consulting: a process that produces a forecast you can trust
We review how you forecast today, where accuracy is lost and what the process is missing, and we redesign it with you: data, levels, models, business adjustments, KPIs and calendar. The result is a demand plan with an owner, measured every month.
- Diagnosis with your data, not a survey
- Statistical forecast and business adjustments kept apart
- Accuracy and bias measured every cycle
- The team sustains it without us
What is demand planning?
Demand planning is the process that turns sales history and business knowledge into an estimate of what customers will buy in the coming months, by item, customer and period. It is the input to everything else: purchasing, production, inventory, budget and the S&OP cycle.
A mature process has four pieces that are rarely all present: a statistical forecast per item generated with models rather than by hand; a step where sales and marketing adjust with what they know (promotions, new customers, prices) without overwriting the model; an approved demand plan with an owner; and error measurement every month, to know which part of the process adds value and which gets in the way.
When one is missing, the usual symptoms appear: one person builds the forecast in Excel and nobody else understands it, sales inflates it, operations cuts it, and inventory pays the difference.
What we do
Diagnosis with your data
We measure the accuracy and bias of your current forecast over recent months, classify your catalog by demand pattern and find where accuracy is lost: data, level, model or adjustments.
Level and hierarchies
We define the best level to forecast (item, family, customer, region) and how to break it down. We clean up the product master: families, substitutions, launches.
Statistical forecast
We set up the forecast per item with ForecastSolve or DemandSolve, or improve the one you have. One model per item, chosen by measured error.
Business adjustments
We design the step where sales and marketing enrich the forecast: who adjusts what, at which level, with what evidence, and how to measure whether the adjustment helped or hurt.
KPIs and cycle
Accuracy (WAPE), bias, stability and forecast value added, measured with the right lag. Monthly calendar with an owner for each step.
Handover
We train the team on its own data and support the first cycles until the process runs on its own.
What the project looks like
Diagnosis (2 to 3 weeks)
Sales and inventory extract, catalog classification, accuracy and bias baseline, interviews with planning, sales, purchasing and finance. Deliverable: gap report and prioritized plan.
Design
Forecast levels, hierarchies, adjustment rules, KPIs, calendar and tool. Agreed with each area before anything is built.
Build and validation
We set up the forecast and the dashboard and validate on past months: the team sees the error before trusting the forecast.
Supported first cycles
We run two or three cycles with you, fix what does not work and leave the process documented.
Duration depends on catalog size, data quality and how many areas take part. The diagnosis delivers a concrete calendar.
Who it is for
- Distribution, consumer goods, pharma, food, hardware or spare parts companies with hundreds or thousands of SKUs.
- Teams whose forecast lives in an Excel file only one person understands, or that switch methods every month without measuring which one works.
- Companies about to buy planning software that want to arrive with the process, data and KPIs defined, so they do not pay for an implementation to fix a process problem.
- Operations with stock-outs and overstock at the same time: the classic sign of a forecast with uncontrolled level and bias.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between demand planning and demand forecasting?
The forecast is the statistical estimate of what will sell, computed from history. Demand planning is the full process: the forecast, plus business adjustments, approval, the resulting plan and error measurement. A good forecast without a process gets lost; a process without a good forecast argues over bad numbers.
Do I need software to start?
Not for the diagnosis or the design. For the statistical forecast it does help to have a tool that runs models per item and saves every cycle; that can be ForecastSolve inside Excel for one planner, or DemandSolve for a team.
What data do you need for the diagnosis?
Monthly sales by item and customer for the last 24 to 36 months, the item master with its hierarchies, current inventory and, if it exists, the forecast of recent months to measure its error. An ERP extract is enough.
How does it relate to S&OP?
Demand planning is the second step of the S&OP cycle. Many clients start here and, once the forecast is reliable, extend the process to supply and finance with S&OP consulting.
Do you work outside Panama?
Yes, across the Americas, in Spanish, English and Portuguese. Diagnosis and support are done by video call; we visit the operation when the project calls for it.
How much error does your forecast have today? Let's start by measuring it.
Tell us how you forecast and with how many SKUs. We will tell you what we would measure first and what to expect from the diagnosis.
Book 15 minutes →