Harper Company sells toys, so its sales are heavily concentrated in the last quarter of the year because of holiday buying. Harper reported total sales for the past three years as follows (all numbers are in thousands):

To make advance arrangements with suppliers, you have been asked to forecast Harper€™s fourth-quarter sales for the year 2012.
Instructions:
1. Ignore the quarterly sales data given by Harper. Forecast fourth-quarter 2012 sales using just the annual sales data. Describe your assumptions.
2. Repeat (1), but this time use the quarterly sales data.
3. Repeat (2) but also incorporate the fact that first-quarter sales in 2012 were $14,000.
4. Comment on the usefulness of quarterlydata.

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Quarter Ending September 30 December 31 March 31 June 30 Total 2009 2010 2011 S 6,000 8,000 0,000 6.000 8,000 0,000 $6,000 8,000 0,000 $12,000 16,000 20,000 $30,000 40,000 50,000