Tutorial part 1 — Set up your company

This three-part tutorial builds a complete forecast from scratch. By the end you'll have modelled a small business, read its forecast statements and runway, and tested a decision against it. In part one, you set up the company itself.

We'll build the same example the whole way through: Bloom & Wick, a small online candle maker — one product, one hire, a couple of costs and a little funding. Follow along with your own business as you go.

Create your account#

Create your account to begin. bluprnts starts a new company for you and opens onboarding on the first step.

If you'd rather explore before committing, open the live demo — but to build your own forecast you'll want an account, since the demo doesn't save.

Name your company#

Give the company a name (Bloom & Wick), and set your country and currency. These frame every figure and report. For our example that's the United Kingdom and GBP. You can adjust these and the rest of your company details later — see Company profile.

Set your forecast window and financial year#

Two settings decide the shape of the forecast:

• Forecast window — how many years ahead you model. bluprnts defaults to five years.
• Financial year — the month your financial year ends (the UK default is March, an April-to-March year). bluprnts opens with a short period up to your first year end, then runs whole financial years, so the forecast always closes on a year end.

Leave the defaults for Bloom & Wick. The full detail is in Forecast window & financial year.

Enter your opening position#

Tell bluprnts where the business starts financially — most importantly your opening bank balance, the cash you have on day one. Bloom & Wick starts with £5,000 in the bank. See Opening position for the other starting balances you can set.

What's next#

Your company is set up. Next you'll describe what it actually does.

• Continue to Part 2 — Build the plan