Text tables in Tableau - Real Business Scenario

Scenario Mode

👤 Your Role: You are a sales analyst at a retail company.

📋 Request: Your manager wants a clear table showing total sales and total profit by product category and region for the last quarter.

📊 Data: You have sales transaction data including Product Category, Region, Sales Amount, Profit, and Date.

🎯 Deliverable: Create a text table in Tableau that displays Product Category as rows, Region as columns, and shows total Sales and total Profit in the table cells.

Sample Data

Product Category	Region	Sales Amount	Profit	Date
Furniture	East	1200	300	2024-03-15
Furniture	West	850	200	2024-04-10
Technology	East	1500	400	2024-03-20
Technology	West	1300	350	2024-04-05
Office Supplies	East	700	150	2024-03-25
Office Supplies	West	600	120	2024-04-12
Furniture	East	1100	280	2024-04-01
Technology	East	1400	370	2024-04-15
Office Supplies	West	650	130	2024-03-30
Furniture	West	900	220	2024-03-18

1

Step 1: Connect your Tableau workbook to the sales transaction data source.

Use the provided data table with columns: Product Category, Region, Sales Amount, Profit, Date.

Expected Result

Data is loaded and visible in Tableau's Data pane.

2

Step 2: Filter the data to include only transactions from the last quarter (March-April 2024).

Create a filter on the Date field: Date >= '2024-03-01' AND Date <= '2024-04-30'.

Expected Result

Only rows with dates in March and April 2024 remain.

3

Step 3: Create a text table with Product Category as rows and Region as columns.

Drag 'Product Category' to Rows shelf and 'Region' to Columns shelf.

Expected Result

Table layout shows product categories vertically and regions horizontally.

4

Step 4: Add total Sales Amount and total Profit as values in the table cells.

Drag 'Sales Amount' to Text on Marks card and set aggregation to SUM. Then drag 'Profit' to Text as well (they concatenate), or create a calculated field: STR(SUM([Sales Amount])) + CHAR(10) + STR(SUM([Profit])) for line break.

Expected Result

Each cell shows SUM of Sales Amount and SUM of Profit for that Product Category and Region.

5

Step 5: Format the text table for clarity: add headers, adjust font size, and align text.

Use Format pane to set font size to 12pt, align text center, and add bold headers.

Expected Result

Text table is easy to read with clear headers and aligned numbers.

6

Step 6: Add a title to the worksheet: 'Sales and Profit by Product Category and Region - Last Quarter 2024'.

Use Worksheet > Show Title and edit the title text accordingly.

Expected Result

Worksheet has a descriptive title at the top.

Final Result

-------------------------------------------------------------
| Product Category | East Sales | East Profit | West Sales | West Profit |
-------------------------------------------------------------
| Furniture        | 2300       | 580         | 1750       | 420         |
| Technology       | 2900       | 770         | 1300       | 350         |
| Office Supplies  | 700        | 150         | 1250       | 250         |
-------------------------------------------------------------

✓East region has higher sales and profit in Furniture and Technology categories.

✓West region shows moderate sales but lower profit compared to East.

✓Office Supplies sales are lower overall but West region has more sales than East.

Bonus Challenge

Add a calculated field to show Profit Margin (%) for each Product Category and Region in the text table.

Show Hint

Create a calculated field: Profit Margin = SUM(Profit) / SUM([Sales Amount]) * 100, then add it to the text table.