I want to wholeheartedly thank Robin and Sally for trusting me as the new steward of the incredible CPG Data Tip Sheet. As they mentioned in their post last week, the site truly helped me get up to speed on CPG analytics, fundamentals, and terminology when I started my career at Nielsen over a decade […]
distribution
Who’s NOT Selling My Products? or How to Identify Distribution Voids
Let’s start with stating the obvious: Shoppers cannot buy your products if they are not available where they shop. Even though your brand may have 12 different items in its product line, not every retailer carries every item. You can identify which retailers sell which items using a relatively straightforward data pull from IRI or […]
What’s With All These Similar Distribution Measures?? (Max, Reach, Average Weekly, etc.)
We’ve had several questions over the last few months regarding some facts that people are starting to notice are available in their Nielsen, IRI and/or SPINS databases. The names are very similar, but it’s not obvious how the measures are different or when you’d want to use one or the other. (With apologies to Homer […]
Enhancing Your Analysis with TDP, Part 2: Explaining Sales Trends
In a recent post, I illustrated the most common usage of Total Points of Distribution (TDP) – as a substitute for % ACV in velocity calculations. In this post, I’ll share another one of my favorite ways to leverage the TDP data metric, which is explaining sales trends. If you aren’t familiar with TDP, read […]
Using TDP to Enhance Your Analysis, Part 1: Velocity
TDP (a.k.a. Total Distribution Points) is my favorite syndicated data measure. Why? Because distribution is fundamental to any business question. Therefore, it’s a great place to start when looking for answers. And TDP is the broadest, most flexible way to examine this crucial dimension. If you are looking at individual UPCs, you don’t need TDP – […]
All About ACV
Earlier this year, we received a frustrated email from a reader. He wrote: “Once and for all, I would like to know exactly what ACV is. You hear several definitions depending on the site you visit. Then I would like to know how to calculate it, what it tells me, and why suppliers should care.” […]




