Bar chart - variance calculation

juul2222

New Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2017
Messages
18
Rookie here, so take it easy on me. I'm trying to make a simple chart that shows the cost to move into two separate locations, and I'd like to graphically show the variance between location A and B but not as a separate bar. Something like a dotted line between the two with the dollar amount shown. Ideas?

ProjectsLocation ALocation B
Base CEC - 400 $ 8,275,685 $ 9,792,741
Incremental CEC - 505 $ 20,042 $ 1,521,014
Total CEC $ 8,295,727 $ 11,313,755
Incremental EMS/Security $ - $ -
NET $ 8,295,727 $ 11,313,755

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You might consider a Stacked Column. I tweaked your data to look like this:

ABCD
1ProjectsLocation ALocation BLocation B
2Base CEC - 400$8,275,685 $1,517,056 $9,792,741
3Incremental CEC - 505$20,042 $1,500,972 $1,521,014
4Total CEC$8,295,727 $3,018,028 $11,313,755
5Incremental EMS/Security0$0 0
6NET$8,295,727 $3,018,028 $11,313,755

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Sheet4

Worksheet Formulas
CellFormula
C2=D2-B2

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The location B column is now the difference. Now just select A1:C6, from the Insert tab > Recommended Charts > Stacked Column > OK. If you hover your mouse over the orange or blue parts of the bars, you'll see the differential.

Hope this helps.
 
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Ideally, I would have location A and B side by side, and the actual variance would be displayed. This will be put on an executive summary and the audience won't be able to hover. With that said, A is always lower than B, so if I could stack the variance on top of A, that could work but I can't seem to figure that out.
 
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That's how I originally designed it, with the variance on top of location A. Did you put the variance formula in C, not the actual location B values? And then only select A:C, not A:D?

Another option is to leave the location A and B columns alone, and add another column to the right with Variance as the heading. Put the =C2-B2 formula in column D. Then pick the Clustered Column type of chart.
 
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First of all, thanks so much! And, yes, I did A:D, but A:C only gives you one bar for each scenario as opposed to the locations side by side. When you do the variance in column D and do a clustered column, the variance shows as a third bar, which isn't a good representation. I found the following link to be the exact thing I'm looking for, but I can't recreate it. When I try to copy and paste the example into my worksheet, the table doesn't come with it. I can recreate the table, but I don't know how to create a stacked chart with some columns but not others.

https://www.excelcampus.com/charts/variance-clustered-column-bar-chart/
 
Upvote 0
For a bar chart, try this.

A
BCDE
1Projects Location B Location A Base Variance
2NET $ 11,313,755 $ 8,295,727 $ 8,295,727 $ 3,018,028
3Incremental EMS/Security $ - $ - $ - $ -
4Total CEC $ 11,313,755 $ 8,295,727 $ 8,295,727 $ 3,018,028
5Incremental CEC - 505 $ 1,521,014 $ 20,042 $ 20,042 $ 1,500,972
6Base CEC - 400 $ 9,792,741 $ 8,275,685 $ 8,275,685 $ 1,517,056

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Note: Location A and Location B columns have been interchanged. The order of projects has been reversed. Bar charts require some non-intuitive data-source configurations.

D2:: =C2
E2:: =MAX(B2:C2)-MIN(B2:C2)

Select A1:E6. Insert a Stacked Bar chart.

Select the vertical axis. Bring up the Format pane, Ctrl+1. Select the Bar chart icon, "Axis Options".

Click on Location B series in the chart. In the format pane, set it on the secondary axis. Repeat for the Location A series.

Tip: You can select chart items directly in the format pane. The second line in the pane, just above the icons, has a small downward pointing arrow. Click on the little arrow and make your item selection in the pop-up list box.

From the Design tab, or from the chart's right-click context menu, click on "Change Chart Type". Change one of Location A or Location B series in the pop-up to "Clustered Bar". The other Location series should change simultaneously.

From there, you should be able to follow the ExcelCampus tutorial.

I found Gap widths of 60% and 30% seemed to look OK. To eliminate "Base" from the Legend, select the legend, then select "Base" and press Delete. I formatted the upper axis to the Custom Number Format:
$ 0,,"M";;$ 0
As a final step, I deleted the lower axis.

xQZ3bbP.png


You're on your own for the data labels.
 
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