About three weeks ago, I discussed the Restaurant Performance Index (RPI) put out by the National Restaurant Association (NRA) and speculated as to whether I could predict the RPI using data from my Food Demand Survey (FooDS). I wrote the following:
“Right now, the latest figures available from the National Restaurant Association (NRA) are for March. However, I already have a measure of April’s away from home food expenditures from FooDS (it’s $55.43). A simple linear regression predicts that NRA’s current situation index will be 102.3 for April. ”
The NRA released their latest data on the RPI a couple days ago. Here's what they found:
“The Current Situation Index stood at 102.1 in April – up 1.9 percent from a level of 100.2 in March”
So, three weeks ago my prediction (based on data from the Food Demand Survey (FooDS)) was that the RPI current situation index would go from 100.2 to 102.3. It actually went from 100.2 to 102.1. Overall, I'd say, not too shabby.
While I'm at it, I'll go ahead and make a prediction for NRA's May current situation based on our May FooDS data. It'll go down slightly to 102.0.*
*For those following along, the prediction is a based on a simple linear regression: Current Situation RPI = 93.349+0.161*(Weekly Spending on Food Away from Home from FooDS)