Please help me with the questions.

The questions are based on the project we did (producing metal water bottles). Q1 means quarter 1. Also for question 4, our main customer is Costco then Walmart, and Target.

1. Sales were below plan for Q1 by 15%. That's significant. It seems perhaps less people are buying our bottles. Even with our differentiating features, we are concerned about this trend for the rest of the year. Could it be that retailers want to carry a more recognizable brand? Either way, please advise how you plan to overcome this trend and even recapture lost Q1 sales.

2. In addition to the above, it appears you have a large unfavorable Materials Quantity Variance. This seems to be related to your metal (steel & aluminum). Since this is the largest item in our product cost (42% - 48%), it has a significant bearing on our margins. Please explain what caused this and what you'll do to combat it. It is affecting our gross margins in Q1 by 3% points.

3. As we all know, steel & aluminum prices have has increased substantially these last few months due to the supply chain issues. Your unfavorable Materials Price Variance reveals this and has affected gross margin by 2% points on top of the quantity variance noted above. What will you do to ensure we can maintain reasonable pricing for our main raw material, or gain savings elsewhere to help our gross margins?

4. Costco has announced they may greatly reduce the amount they purchase from us. We knew we had a higher concentration in Costco, but now it may be coming back to haunt us. Please advise how we deal with this significant customer issue that will greatly affect sales.