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Summary.
Predicting consumer demand for goods and services during the Covid-19 pandemic is more complicated than ever. To improve prediction, managers must abandon their biases and seek out new data sets for forecast models, tap local-market knowledge, combine the outputs of many different models, and continually test and refine them.Covid-19 has shattered the demand forecasts that guide retailers and suppliers of consumer goods and services in figuring out how much to order or manufacture, where to stock inventory, and how much to advertise or discount. Early on during the pandemic, sudden lockdowns and a shift to working from home caused panic buying of many food items and household goods. Some items sold out while others languished on shelves.