Hello!

Who are the reports for, are they internal in the company, or external to outside clients?

You could start the report using the first sentence to outline what is in the report, i.e

This report focuses on the productivity of the sales department of the last three months.

or

This report will outline the strategies for marketing in the Far East

( sorry, I don't know anything about paint, bad examples!)

You could also use what is known as a topic sentence, which is quite like the above example, but more succinct. For example if the whole report is about a new line of colours you could start with:

The new range of colours launched in January have received mixed responses.

You could then go on to outline in different paragraphs the different responses and reasons behind them.

If it is an internal document, you may be able to simply place a subject heading as you would in a business email, then launch straight into your report, i.e

NATIONAL OUTPUT FOR 2003

Sales began to steadily rise this year after a poor performance at the end of 2002..........


I hope this is helpful, if you need any more help perhaps you could post the beginning of a previous report you have done and work from that?

Bye!

Juliette