Finding Center of Data

I have zip codes with dollars spent in those zip codes. I woud like to map them out (which I have done) I now have a request to find where the center point on the map so that a location in the middle could be used for a warehouse.

As an Example. If half of the zip codes were in Chicago and Half were in Indianapolis but 70% of the money was spent in Chicago I would like to see so that I could determine maybe Gary Indiana as a Good "Center" of Dollars Spent.

Any idea?

Hi,

If you want to have a fast solution, you have to choose a pragmatic way:

- As you have the information on the map, you can see in approximate way the best location for your warehouse or warehouses.

Put 3 or 4 PushPins as assumptions in the map and for each one calculate a drivetimezone. Export the the Data on the map to Excel and you will see wich one has the best potential. You can make some balanced calculations with Population, Number of households, and so on...
- Now if you want to have a sophisticated solution you need more information about Population, competitive area and Mappoint won't be sufficient.
If you have some time look at this site. You can get more ideas:
http://geography.about.com/cs/citiesurbangeo/a/aa041403a.htm


In my job, when we choose a location for a superstore we can garantee that the error of forecast will not exceed 5%. We don't use Mappoint, we go there and get precise information about distances, customers, competitors, and so on..


Best Regards

Look especially at this:

http://www.msac.com/pptm/images/img20.gif

an this:

http://geography.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://faculty.washington.edu/krumme/systems/gravity.html
Section : Predictive Gravity Modeling for Marketing

When I have enough time and when I control Mappoint better, I will try to apply this theory with Mappoint.

Rgds