Question: The Garden Avenue Seven sells tapes of its musical performances. The following data show sales for the past 8 months . The groups manager wants an accurate method for forecasting future sales.

MONTH SALES

1 293

2 283

3 322

4 355

5 346

6 379

7 381

8 431

9 424

10 433

11 470

12 481

13 549

14 544

15 601

16 587

17 644

18 660

A. Use exponential smoothing, wait a - 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5. Which value of a provides the best forecasts

B. Use trend projection to provide a forecast. What is the value of MSE ?

C. Which method of forecasting would you recommend to the manager? why?