Units Per Store Per Week. It is the standard metric used in grocery retail to measure the velocity (sales speed) of a product on the shelf.

How do I forecast a new product launch?

Without historical data, you must use 'like-item' forecasting. Look at the historical velocity of a similar product in your portfolio (or syndicated data for a competitor's product) and apply that curve to the new SKU.

What is a pipeline fill?

The initial massive order required to stock the shelves and distribution centers when you launch in a new retailer. Pipeline fills are often 3x to 5x larger than the ongoing weekly replenishment orders.

How to Build a CPG Demand Planning Template in Excel

If you are a growing CPG brand, demand planning is the difference between having cash in the bank and having a warehouse full of expired product. While purpose-built operations software is the ultimate goal, most brands start by building a demand planning template in Excel. Here is how to build one that actually works for grocery retail.

The Anatomy of a CPG Demand Plan

A generic e-commerce forecast just draws a straight line based on historical Shopify sales. A CPG demand plan must account for the "lumpy" nature of wholesale grocery. Your template needs three core components:

1. The Baseline Forecast

This is your "everyday" velocity. How many units do you sell per store, per week (UPSPW), when there are no promotions running? You calculate this by taking your historical depletion data from distributor portals (like UNFI Clearview) or retailer portals (like Whole Foods VIP) and smoothing out the spikes.

2. The Promotional Lift (Events)

This is where CPG forecasting gets complicated. If you run a TPR (Temporary Price Reduction) at Sprouts in October, your sales might spike by 300% for those four weeks. Your Excel template must have a separate row to layer these promotional events on top of the baseline forecast.

3. New Distribution (Pipeline)

If your sales team just landed a 500-store authorization at Target launching in March, you need to forecast the massive pipeline fill required to stock those shelves, plus the ongoing baseline velocity for those new stores.

Connecting Demand to Supply (MRP)

A forecast is useless if it doesn't tell you what to buy. The second tab of your Excel template must be a Material Requirements Planning (MRP) calculator.

You must translate the finished goods forecast into raw material requirements. If you forecast selling 10,000 cases of granola in November, your MRP tab must explode that BOM (Bill of Materials) and calculate that you need 5,000 lbs of oats, 1,000 lbs of honey, and 10,000 empty pouches.

Crucially, the MRP tab must factor in supplier lead times. If honey takes 6 weeks to arrive, and your co-packer needs 2 weeks to produce, you must order the honey 8 weeks before the November forecast hits.

When Excel Breaks

This template works beautifully for 5 SKUs and 2 distributors. It breaks catastrophically when you hit 20 SKUs, 5 distributors, and multiple co-packers. The manual data entry required to update the baseline forecast from five different retailer portals becomes a full-time job.

When you reach this breaking point, it is time to move to an operations platform like Guidance, which automatically connects your sales orders, promotional calendar, and BOMs to generate dynamic purchase recommendations.