Understanding the Yardcue Demand Index
Yardcue turns multiple indicators of consumer interest into a single, consistent index for flower and plant retail markets. This page explains what the index means, how to interpret it, and where its limits lie.
What YDI measures
The Yardcue Demand Index (YDI) represents relative market interest in a selected plant category within a selected country. It is designed to help retailers observe seasonal patterns and changes in interest over time.
YDI is not a count of customers, orders or products sold, and it does not measure absolute market size.
How the index is constructed
Yardcue combines multiple market-interest signals after aligning their reporting weeks, normalizing them against a fixed historical reference period, and smoothing short-term fluctuations. The resulting values are brought together into one weekly composite indicator.
As additional information becomes available, the model can evolve. Changes that affect comparability will be identified by model version.
What does 100 mean?
For each plant category and market, a fixed historical reference average is assigned a value of 100.
Values can exceed 100. A higher index for one plant does not establish that it has more customers or higher sales than another plant.
Reading year-over-year change
Interest in flowers and plants can vary significantly by season. For this reason, Yardcue reports the latest four-week period against the corresponding period in the previous year.
For example, a 15% year-over-year increase indicates stronger relative interest compared with the same seasonal period one year earlier. It does not guarantee that sales have increased by 15%.
Data scope and limitations
- The index represents a composite of available interest signals, not audited retail transactions.
- Interest indicators can be affected by changing platform usage and measurement methods.
- Historical patterns do not guarantee future demand.
- Index levels are not absolute market-size comparisons between different plants.
- YDI should complement, not replace, local sales, weather, supplier, price and inventory information.
During the pilot stage, coverage is limited to the plant categories and markets shown on the Market Signals page.