scope:

This is the first inventory attempted by the Committee. Accordingly, the emphasis of the survey is on breadth rather than depth. Using the broad brush, the survey has tried to obtain only a beginning picture of marketing research in action in the petroleum industry. While it has investigated many areas and issues in the field, it has attempted to pursue none to exhaustion. It has tried to point up areas of similarity and areas of difference, but has sought no conclusions. It is earnestly hoped that its findings will stimulate a umber of more penetrating investigations in areas of special interest.

The survey starts out with a history of the development of marketing research in the petroleum industry. It then turns its attention to an examination of the place of marketing research activities in the framework of integrated oil companies, discusses the organizations themselves and reviews the scope of their activities. A final section on operating procedures reviews how research projects originate, are executed and reported by the companies participating in the survey.

While this is the first general survey of marketing research practices, it is not expected to be the last. Periodic surveys of a similar nature are anticipated as a continuing measure of the development and stature of a field which gives promise of being a vital force in one of America's vital industries

Purpose

The survey which is reported in these pages represents a sort of "stock-taking" by the members of the Marketing Research Committee of the American Petroleum Institute. It is an effort to examine the state and stature of the marketing research function in the petroleum industry during 1956.

The Committee hopes to serve two fundamental purposes with the survey:

First, it hopes to promote a better' understanding of marketing research by members of the API, the oil industry and trade publications.

Second, it would like to know more about itself.

As a relatively new group within the API, it was thought that a general survey of marketing research practices which might be carried out early in the life of the Committee would prove to be a valuable tool. It is expected that the survey will be of assistance in organizing the work of the Committee so as to take full . advantage of the experience of its various members. It should also indicate the areas of research which are either being developed or neglected by the industry, and it may well point the way toward improving marketing research practices within individual companies.