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American Marketing Association

Notes on the History of Marketing Research


Author(s): Lawrence C. Lockley
Source: Journal of Marketing, Vol. 14, No. 5 (Apr., 1950), pp. 733-736
Published by: American Marketing Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1246952
Accessed: 25-10-2015 16:49 UTC

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THE
JORNAL
THE yOURNzAL O MARKEING
OF MARKETING 733
73

NOTES ON THE HISTORY OF MARKETING RESEARCH


THE advances in the techniques of agency wired to state officialsand pub-
market research since the early lishers throughout the country asking
nineteen-thirtieshave seemed so great for informationon grain production.As
that present practitionersare prone to a result,the agencywas able to construct
feel a sense of discovery; they feel that a crude but formal market survey by
they are the pioneers who "invented" states and counties.2
market research.Actually, the practice Though this was an early instance of
of market researchon an informalbasis market research,it was not long an iso-
is old. Even the Childrenof Israel sent lated instance. George B. Waldronwas
interviewersout to sample the market doing qualitative research for Mahin's
and the produce of Canaan. And the AdvertisingAgency around I9oo.3 Har-
merchantfamiliesof Fuggerand Roths- low Gale, at the University of Minne-
child prospered in part because their sota, was using mailed questionnairesto
far-flungorganizationsenabled them to obtain opinions on advertisingin I8954
get marketinformationbeforetheircom- and in I9oI, Walter Dill Scott under-
petitors did. took a programof experimentalresearch
In the United States, marketresearch on advertising for the Agate Club of
techniques can be traced back over a Chicago.5
century."The HarrisburgPennsylvanian It was not till around I9Io that evi-
of July 24, 1824, printed a report of a dences of market research became fre-
straw vote taken at Wilmington,Dela- quent enough to indicate that a new
ware, 'without Discrimination of Par- field of business activity had made a
ties.' In this poll, Andrew Jackson re- a serious start. The idea of what later
ceived 335 votes; John Quincy Adams, was called market researchbecame en-
169; Henry Clay, I9; and William H. demic to the period between I9IO and
Crawford,9. Again, in August of the 1920. Theremust have beena goodmany
same year, the Raleigh Star undertook businessmen who graspedthe idea that
to canvass political meetings held in industry,whichwas striving fornational
North Carolina 'at which the sense of scope and reachingout for nationalmar-
the people was taken'."' Though these kets fortrade-markedmerchandise,must
instanceswerenot marketresearch,they build on knowledge,and thereforemust
did use some of the tools of market re- develop methods of finding out about
search. marketing and marketing processes.
More by accident than by foresight, But the survivingcreditnecessarilygoes
N. W. Ayer & Son, one of the pioneer to those who publishedtheir work.
advertising agencies, made the first Of those, one of the foremostwas Mr.
applicationof market researchto mar- J. GeorgeFrederick,still the headof The
ketingand advertisingproblems.In 1879 BusinessBourse,a researchorganization
in attempting to fit a proposedschedule 2
Ralph M. Hower, The History of an Advertising
of advertisementsto the needs of the Agency, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1939,
Nichols-Shepard Company, manufac- pp.8 88-90.)
turers of agricultural machinery, the Coolsen, Frank G., Pioneers in the Development of
Advertising, JOURNALOF MARKETING, Vol. XII, No. I,
(July, 1947) pp. 80-86.
1 George Gallup & Saul F. Rae, The Pulse of Democ- 4 Ibid.
racy (New York: Simon & Schuster, I940, p. 35.) 6 Ibid.

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734 THE OURNAL OF MARKETING

which he helped to form in I908.6 Early His first clients were CosmopolitanMag-
interested in the concept of market re- azine, and Christian Herald. His first
search by the advertisementsfor John industrial client was the General Elec-
Wanamakerwritten by John Powerson tric Company, for which, in I917, he did
the basisof field research(a seriesbegin- a survey to determine the significance to
ning in I888), Mr. Frederick left the the public of the "Mazda" trade mark.
editorshipof PrintersInk in April, 191I, Perhaps chronologically the next de-
to devote full time to headingthe Busi- velopment was the establishment of a
ness Bourse, and to doing market re- Bureau of Business Research at the
search as an independent contractor. Harvard Graduate School of Business
Among his early clients, Mr. Frederick Administration-another evidence of the
reports, were the Texas Company and foresight of A. W. Shaw.8 Organized re-
GeneralElectric. He estimates that not search work at the Harvard Business
more than $5o,ooo was spent in gather- School grew out of discussions between
ing market information-even infor- A. W. Shaw and Dr. Edwin F. Gay,
mally-in the year 1910. then Dean of the School, in 1911. The
Another early convert to research impetus for this work came from the
concepts was R. O. Eastman, still oper- School, and met considerable resistance
ating head of the research firm which from business men. The first project was
bears his name.7 In I9II, while adver- on the operating expenses of retail shoe
tising managerof the Kellogg Company stores, under the direction of the late Dr.
of Battle Creek,Michigan,Mr. Eastman Paul T. Cherington, and led to the de-
interestedbetween forty and fifty mem- velopment of standard classifications of
bers of the Associationof National Ad- retail accounts, which have become basic
vertising Managers-as the Association in retail control and research. Since that
of National Advertiserswas then called time, of course, the Harvard Business
-in a cooperative postcard question- School has continued with a steady
naireon magazinereadership.This early stream of annual and occasional studies
study may have been the firstsystematic of expenses of operation for a wide range
readershipresearchdone, and, according of retail trades.
to Mr. Eastman, introducedthe impor- Although the several developments in
tant concept of duplication of circula- market research up to I9II indicated
tion. both a growing need for and a growing
In the following year, I912, a more interest in market research, it was the
elaborate questionnairewas developed, entrance into the field of Charles Coo-
and Kellogg salesmen, during their off- lidge Parlin, for nearly 30 years the man-
season, were used as interviewers. In ager of the Commercial Research Divi-
I916, while working for the advertising sion of The Curtis Publishing Com-
agency of Fuller & Smith, Mr. Eastman pany, which dramatized this fledgling
became so heavily involved in another science and afforded the precedent many
cooperative survey that he decided to other firms were to follow. Mr. Parlin
open his own research firm, under the came to The Curtis Publishing Com-
name of the Eastman Research Bureau.
pany in June, 191I, at the instance of the
6
then manager of Curtis' Boston office,
Data on Mr. Frederick's early contributions to
market research were obtained from him by correspond-
ence. 8 Based on correspondence with Professor Melvin T.
7 Information based on
correspondence with Mr. Copeland, for many years Director of Research of the
Eastman. Harvard Business School Bureau of Business Research.

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THE 7OURNAL
JOURNAL OF MARKETING 735
735

Mr. Stanley R. Latshaw.9His first stud- The work of Mr. Parlin and of other
ies were studies of entire industries- men encouragedby his examplereceived
agriculturalimplements,textiles, foods, the lion's share of the publicity. Yet in
and automobiles.These were studies of 1916, The ChicagoTribunepublished a
marketingstructuresof the industries- market study of the city of Chicago.12
broadin their sweep, yet affordingguid- This study was based on house-to-house
ance where none had previously been interviewing, and produced marketing
available.In connectionwith the textile facts on the consumer population by
study in 1912, Mr. Parlin built up a tab- residentialdistricts.
ulationof the volumesof sales of depart- Although the questionnaireused was
ment storesin cities of 54,oooandover- primitiveand biasingby to-day's stand-
a tabulation sufficiently accurate to ards, and althoughthere is no indication
withstandconsiderablechecking.It may of concernover samplingtechniques,it
have been that other research groups is likely that the techniques were not
did as much and as good market re- extemporized. The questionnaire was
search as Mr. Parlin and his assistants dated February, I913. At that time, in
did between 1911 and I926. But the all probability,there was a considerable
personalityof Mr. Parlin and the pub- amount of market researchgoing on-
licity given his work by The Curtis enough to allow conclusions on tech-
PublishingCompanyand its advertising niques gradually to crystallize, and to
space salesmengave his work a stature broaden the interest of the business
which assureshim a priorand important public.
place in the developmentof market re- Dr. C. S. Duncan publishedCommer-
search. cial Research"in I919. The book is a
In June, I915, Dr. Paul H. Nystrom straightforward discussion of market
becamemanagerof commercialresearch research principles, and many of its
for the U. S. Rubber Company. Dr. pages have a decidedlyfreshand current
Nystromwrites,"Thesuggestionto have flavor even to-day. In 1921, Percival
marketresearch,or commercialresearch White published MarketAnalysis.l4By
as it was called, carriedon in the U. S. 1924, there was enough generalinterest
RubberCompanywas firstmade to that in market researchfor the organization
Companyby C. C. Parlin,then in charge of the ResearchGroup,as a part of the
of CommercialResearchfor The Curtis Advertising Club of New York; on its
PublishingCompany.It was he also who organization meeting, October 23, 1924,
recommendedme to begin the work in nearly a hundred members came.15
that Company."10 Likewise,the late Dr. One of the most important mile stones
Louis D. H. Weld undertookto carryon in the development of market research
market research for Swift & Company was the development of interest by the
in 1917. He writes, "So, inspiredlargely United States Department of Commerce
by the work of Parlin for Curtis Pub- in supplying business and marketing
lishing Company,I suggested that they n Letter from Dr. L. D. H.
make me managerof a new department, 12 The
Weld, April I7, I945.
MerchandisingServiceDepartment,The Chi-
-the Commercial Research Depart- cagoTribune,Winninga GreatMarketon Facts,1916.
ment."" 13 C. S. Duncan, CommercialResearch, An Outline of
WorkingPrinciples(New York:The MacmillanCom-
9 Information on the
development of market research pany, I919).
in The Curtis Publishing Company is based on corre- 14 Percival
White,MarketAnalysis,Its Principlesand
spondence with Mr. Stanley R. Latshaw, and on un- Methods (New York: McGraw-Hill, I921).
published materials in the files of the Company. 15AdvertisingClub News, The AdvertisingClub of
10 Letter from Dr. Paul H. New York, November, 1924.
Nystrom, May 14, I945.

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736
736 THE JOURN,AL
JOURNAL OF MARKETING

data. On October 29, I926 a conference opment of theoriesof systematic and of


was held in Washington.16 Out of the random sampling as applied to market
interest which caused this conference to research to allow market research to
be held, and with the support it made attain to a degree of maturity. And it
possible, the Department of Commerce was not till the mid-nineteen-thirties
was able to undertake such monumen- that sampling has been put within the
tal studies as the St. Louis Drug Survey reach of the market analyst.17
and the Louisville Grocery Survey; to Although the techniques now avail-
lay the groundwork for the 1929 Census able for the use of the market analyst
of Distribution; and to plan and execute are elaborate and intricate, it is clear
a number of studies on distribution cost that the growthof principlesforthis field
analysis. has been a slow, steady growth, and one
With the collection of economic and which has been a good many years a-
marketing data on a large scale by the building.
government market research flourished. LAWRENCEC. LOCKLEY
It still lacked the precision which could GraduateSchoolof BusinessAdministra-
allow it to offer highly dependable road tion
signs to business. It required the devel- New York University
17 Frederick F.
16Domestic Commerce Stephan, "History of the Uses of
Division, U. S. Department of Modern Sampling Procedures," 7ournal of the American
Commerce, Proceedings of the Conference on Market Statistical Association, Vol. 43, No. 241, pp. 12-39,
Research, held at Washington, D. C., October 29, 1926. passim.

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