Introduction
This report visualizes account activity movement over time, not just a net change. For each date, it shows two flows at once:
New Active Accounts (inflow) above zero
Lost Active Accounts (outflow) below zero
The goal is to make daily shifts easy to read, with a gradient background to emphasize the “above/below” balance.
Requirements
A Date table related to the fact table (orders).
A clear definition of Active Account using a rolling window (example: last 30 days).
Two independent measures (so you can have both + and − on the same date):
New Active Accounts: active today, not active yesterday
Lost Active Accounts: active yesterday, not active today (plotted as negative)
A stacked column chart with:
dynamic Y-axis min/max (to keep the visual aligned)
two spacer (dummy) measures to “fill” the chart up to the axis limits
A background gradient image layered behind the chart for the balance effect.
Dataset
Sales Orders data with at least:
Order DateCustomer ID
Plus a connected Date dimension.
Share
After you finish your workout, share on Bluesky or LinkedIn using the hashtags #WOW2025 and #PowerBI, and tag @MMarie, @shan_gsd, @KerryKolosko (on BlueSky).
Solution
Measures created:
Active Accounts (rolling window)
New Active Accounts (today’s active set minus yesterday’s)
Lost Active Accounts (yesterday’s active set minus today’s, shown negative)
Axis Radius / Axis Min / Axis Max (to control chart range consistently)
Growth Spacer / Loss Spacer (technical fillers for the balance layout)
Visual built as a stacked column chart with the series ordered like:
New Active Accounts → Growth Spacer → Lost Active Accounts → Loss SpacerY-axis range set via measures (fx) so the layout stays stable when filtering.
Gradient background added as an image and placed behind the chart; spacers can be styled to blend into the background while the real values remain readable.