Mosaic Chart - Marimekko Chart

Mosaic charts (a.k.a. marimekko charts) take data points and convert them into percentages and map them as a boxy bar chart. In the example below, a restaurant owner wants to know if the type of music playing in the background affects the type of wine purchased by customers.

In this case, Italian music increases Italian wine purchases (center bar) and French music increases French wine purchases (bottom right bar), but I find this format difficult to analyze. Some argue that this is a form of chart junk that hides the information needed to make good decisions.

Pareto Chart Alternative
Instead of creating a mosaic plot, we could select the data:

And run Pareto charts using the QI Macros:

From these three charts, it's easy to see that the Other and French Paretos are pretty flat, meaning that music may have little or no impact on the wine selected. If we look at the Italian wine (middle pareto), however, Italian music has a significant impact on whether or not Italian wine is choosen. French music effectively kills Italian wine sales.

If we look at total wine sold, no music or Italian music sells about 12% more wine than French music:

This isn't evident from the Mosaic plot.

Here's My Point
There's more than one way to display data on charts. Trying to cram everything onto one chart can make it hard to decipher and hide critical information. When in doubt, use multiple charts to make the case clearly.

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