Excel Questions Business Analysis

Assignment 6: Analyzing Distribution Types and Trend Lines in Excel

Scenario: You are a data analyst for a small retail company, and your manager has asked you to analyze customer purchasing trends over the past year. You have been provided with sales data from different store locations. Your task is to examine the distribution of monthly sales, identify trends, and visualize the data using Excel.

Data Set (Copy into Excel):

Month	Store A Sales ($)	Store B Sales ($)	Store C Sales ($)	Store D Sales ($)
Jan	4200	3800	5000	4700
Feb	4600	3900	5200	4800
Mar	4800	4200	5300	4900
Apr	5000	4300	5400	5000
May	5100	4500	5500	5200
Jun	5200	4600	5600	5300
Jul	5300	4800	5700	5500
Aug	5400	4900	5800	5600
Sep	5500	5000	5900	5700
Oct	5600	5200	6000	5800
Nov	5700	5300	6100	6000
Dec	5800	5400	6200	6100

Assignment Details/Instructions:

Using Excel’s Data Analysis Toolpak, complete the following tasks:

1. Create Frequency Distributions:

· Generate a histogram for Store A’s monthly sales.

· Set appropriate bin ranges for the histogram or let the system do it for you.

2. Analyze the Distribution Shape:

· Describe the shape of the histogram (e.g., normal, skewed).

3. Create Trend Lines:

· Create a line graph showing the sales trends for all four stores over the year.

· Add a trend line for Store A and Store C and display the equation on the chart.

· Identify whether the trend is linear, exponential, or polynomial.