The popular War Stories column, which presents humorous tales of life in the research trenches, has historically been compiled by Art Shulman, president of Shulman Research in Van Nuys, Calif. Each month in our e-newsletters we feature anecdotes from past War Stories columns and over time, we have received a handful of submissions from our e-newsletter readers who want to share their own outlandish or otherwise entertaining experiences of research gone just-slightly awry. Submit your own War Story today!
A wedding present
Moderator Saul Cohen reports that during interviews on electric irons, a woman reported receiving the client’s product 11 years ago as a wedding present. When Cohen asked if it still worked, the woman inquired, “The iron or the marriage?”
“Whichever,” answered Cohen.
To which the woman answered, “Well, the iron still gets hot.”
On America's Most Wanted
May 21, 2018
Mark Michaelson relates that a number of years ago his company sent a mystery shopper to evaluate an optical store in Florida. The shopper seemed like a nice guy on the phone and his references were good. For the shop he had to get an exam, buy glasses and return to pick them up. In between his shopping trips to the store, he was featured on America's Most Wanted. The store manager recognized him and had him arrested after he picked up his glasses. He still managed to send his report in, though.
Swarming with ladybugs
May 7, 2018
Sue Gartzman will confirm that market research can sometimes drive you buggy. She tells about conducting a focus group where a ladybug was on the table next to her name tag. Pretty benign, she figured, so she brushed it away.
The respondents came in and got settled. During introductions, she noticed another ladybug crawling on the table. She brushed it and it flew away. Then one landed on a respondent, who brushed it away. When introductions were finished and the discussion began, Gartzman saw another bug fly in the air. She looked up, and the light fixtures were swarming with ladybugs. By now she was completely distracted and feeling really creepy-crawly, and her respondents were feeling a little strange too! Fortunately, after stepping out in somewhat of a panic and alerting the facility operator to the situation, her group and a back room full of viewers were able to move to another room. She'd thought it was going to be the first time she canceled a group due to ladybugs!
In the basement
April 23, 2018
Mike Exinger of Clearwater Research reports doing a survey on computer peripherals where respondents were asked about computer types, printers and software. When one office manager was asked, "Do you have Windows?" she replied, "No, we're in the basement!"
Two Great Danes
April 9, 2018
Yvonne Filla tells about an experience from a time she personally went on a door-to-door survey. A middle-aged male respondent asked her to wait in the living room, which was devoid of furniture. The gentleman explained that the living room lacked furniture because he owned dogs. When he returned a few minutes later, he was naked, with two huge Great Danes by his side. Somehow Filla managed to leave the domicile without being bitten.
Apathy
March 26, 2018
Political pollster Amie Steinberg, speaking at an American Marketing Association meeting, reported that in one of his surveys consumers were asked on an aided basis which of the potential candidates for senator they were aware of. One consumer indicated that he had heard of none of the candidates, who included the current senator of the state, a former vice president of the United States and several other luminaries. Later in the survey, when asked what was the greatest problem facing the nation today, the same respondent replied, "Apathy."
Fax a hard copy
March 12, 2018
Ricardo Lopez once heard a woman say that she tried for days to fax a hard copy of a one-page document via her computer, but couldn't. She said the "help" file said to "Make sure you hold the fax on the screen before attempting to hit the send button." She kept holding the piece of paper on the screen but it would not work!
All hands were raised
February 26, 2018
When first breaking into the research business, Kevin C. Reilly was asked to attend a rally for a Midwestern Evangelist preacher, for whom his firm was conducted an extensive quantitative study. During his performance to a packed auditorium of several thousand loyal followers, the reverend at one point asked, “How many of you thought that I would take up a collection tonight?” With some hesitation, hands slowly began to go up throughout the auditorium, until virtually all hands were raised. At this point the preacher started forthrightly, “I will not disappoint you!”
Fooling a pesky salesman
February 12, 2018
Dick Kurtz cites a door-to-door study where he went to great lengths to get an interview. At one house, a woman agreed to do the interview on the condition that Kurtz pretend to be her husband to fool a pesky salesman. It seems the salesman had talked her into buying a vacuum cleaner the prior day and was scheduled to arrive shortly to collect the check. Sure enough, the salesman soon showed up and Kurtz, then a naive young researcher, convinced the salesman that "his wife" had been high-pressured to buy the overpriced vacuum cleaner and didn't want it. Kurtz refused the salesman's offer of a personal demonstration of the vacuum cleaner, and felt that he did his part to improve the image of market researchers and their ability to serve consumers.
Afterwards, Kurtz collected his hard-earned reward - he completed the interview.
Lights on
January 22, 2018
Cathy Castenaeda cites a focus group she observed with about a dozen senior executives of a financial services company she worked for. One of the executives, attending his first focus group discussion, turned on the light in the viewing room, leaving the executives clearly visible to the group of women on the other side of the mirror. Some of the executives dove to the floor. Others sheepishly smiled.
None of my business
January 8, 2018
Usually, it’s the clients who complain about the recruiting for groups, insisting that someone doesn’t belong in the group. However, Laird Brown recalls being in the viewing room observing a focus group of small business owners. The door to the observation room suddenly burst open and a large and unpleasant-looking man strode forward and started pounding on the one-way glass, shouting, “Get her out of there! Don’t you tell them anything about my business!” The respondents turned toward the mirror, which Brown was afraid the man would shatter.
Shortly, the hostess went into the respondent room and escorted one of the women out of the group. Apparently they had recruited the office manager in place of the business owner and the owner was none too pleased about it.
Man in the mirror
December 27, 2017
Mary Ann Farrell tells of a focus group she heard about among women who had very recently had babies. Before the session, one of the women walked up to the mirror to apply lipstick. At that instant, as she was attending to her reflection, one of the clients in the viewing room – standing just behind the mirror – lit a match for his cigarette. The woman suddenly saw through the mirror, superimposed on her face, the face of a man with a flame in front of it. She fainted dead away and had to be revived.
Neutral on Christmas
December 11, 2017
Kevin Reilly reports conducting a focus group with five-year-olds and explaining a five-point rating scale utilizing the familiar face of Snoopy from the "Peanuts" comic strip. On this scale, the emotive expressions on Snoopy's face ran from "elated" to "sad." In order to test kids' understanding of the rating scale, Reilly first gave them a few throwaway questions, usually extremes on the emotional spectrum. First, he asked them to, "Point to the face that tells me how much you like boiled broccoli."
Understandably, the responses were mostly negative all around.
Then, to check the high end of the scale, he asked kids to, "Point to the face that tells me how you'd feel if every day were Christmas." As expected, responses were very enthusiastic - except for one boy who offered a more neutral rating. When asked why, his response was quite matter-of-fact: "It wouldn't really be a big deal to me ... I'm Jewish."
Phone interruption
November 20, 2017
Ken Rosenhek cites a story told to him about a president of a large market research company whose presentation in the board room at his client's corporate headquarters was interrupted by the phone ringing. When the person answering the phone announced, "Someone wants to know if we have a 'Secksauer' here."
One of the participants cracked, "Hell no! We don't even get a coffee break!"
Toilet bowl cleaner
November 6, 2017
A few years ago, Rob Podhurst was conducting an in-store intercept study for a brand of toilet bowl cleaner. When he got to the store where the interviews were to take place, he discovered that the store was out of stock on the product. Quickly improvising, Podhurst headed over to a rival supermarket and filled a shopping cart with the needed product.
As he stood in line to pay, he noticed he was getting some very strange looks from the woman in line behind him. Seizing the moment, he leaned over to her and whispered, "I've got a very busy day ahead of me!"
Massage in a spa room
October 23, 2017
Erin Read says she is often torn between cursing and loving open-ended questions. Pros: unfettered truths that amuse and inspire. Cons: 27 different ways of spelling Facebook.
One of her research efforts involved asking participants which images they preferred from a series of photo sets, followed by an open-ended question of why they liked that image. One photo set was of an empty spa room vs. a smiling gentleman receiving a massage in a spa room. Read’s aim was to see which was more compelling: the product pic or the product-in-use imagery.
One Baby Boomer, when asked why she preferred the image with the product-in-use, was compelled to explain, “I dearly love nearly naked men.”
An elderly minister
October 9, 2017
Is there such a thing as too much honesty?
Jeff Totten cites a mail study where his firm sent out a small amount of money as an incentive. An elderly minister returned the money, along with the questionnaire, writing how sinful it was to “guilt” people into responding.
Hordes of gnats
September 25, 2017
The owner of several focus facilities, requesting anonymity, reports when she opened a beautiful brand new facility a regular client sent over a huge flower arrangement, which the service proudly displayed. The next day, the owner noticed the flowers were drooping and dying, and decided to toss them out. But as soon as she removed the flowers from the vase, thousands of gnats flew out.
At that evening’s focus sessions, respondents were very animated. Not because of the test product but because of the hordes of gnats swarming around them.
Tartar and plaque
September 11, 2017
During one group among denture wearers, the discussion turned to tartar and plaque. When one man said something moderator Sharon Livingston couldn’t understand, he removed his denture, thrust it in her face and asked, “Is this what you’re talking about, honey?”
Sing Sing prison
August 21, 2017
When Lloyd Wohlner was doing marketing research at a consumer magazine a few years ago, he mailed out a survey on topics his readers would like to see in future issues. One man mailed back a response indicating a high interest in hand tools and no interest in cars, which was a very unusual response compared to the magazine's typical male respondents. Then Wohlner checked the ZIP code against the original mailing list. The respondent lived in Ossining, N.Y. - Sing Sing prison to be exact. Wohlner wondered whether the respondent's interest in cars would increase after he used certain hand tools.
Annual household income
August 7, 2017
Ron Sellers tells about monitoring a telephone interview as a project director at a research company. All went well until they got to the demographics. The respondent described his marital status as single, then his occupation as "project director for a marketing research company." There was no industry screen on the questionnaire so that wasnít a problem. But Sellers' eyebrows shot up when the respondent indicated his annual household income was $100,000.
Sellers says his boss heard about that one at salary review time.
Gas attacks
July 24, 2017
Linda Fitzpatrick tells about conducting a group with blue-collar male antacid users to get their reactions to some anti-gas positionings. Things were going smoothly until she got a note from the viewing room: "Find out more about their gas symptoms! Is there odor? Noise?" Sensing it was too late to back out of the project, she proceeded down this treacherous path. Slowly, they got into the specifics of their gas attacks, becoming absorbed with tales of misery and embarrassment. Finally, one ribald respondent blurted out, "Good thing there aren't any women here!"
Evidently, he forgot about Fitzpatrick.
Cat litter
July 10, 2017
Gail Fleenor recalls a woman in a focus group about supermarket chains who claimed her husband wanted to shop at a particular supermarket which she detested. When asked why hubby insisted on shopping there, she said, "He buys cat litter there. He's very particular about his cat litter!"
Demo disks
June 26, 2017
As sales director for Computers for Marketing Corp., Joyce Rachelson sends out a lot of demo disks of the company’s software. Recently she got a phone call from a prospective client who seemed upset because he couldn’t get the demo to run. When Rachelson asked what the message he saw on his computer screen was, he told her “Hit Any Key to Continue.” The potential client went on to say that he couldn’t find the “any” key on his keyboard.
In the dumpster
June 12, 2017
Many years ago, as a young analyst working in the CPG arena, a colleague of mine was managing an in-home test of a new dip. She approached me one day in a slight panic and said, "I don't know what to do about these results." It was a simple question of where consumers expected to find the product in the store. Enough people selected "other specify" with the response "in the dumpster" that it was coded and showing up in the client tables. After tasting the sample myself, I recommended leaving that consumer suggestion.
Out of a computer
May 22, 2017
Mike Halberstam of Interviewing Services of America reports that an elderly female respondent contacted in one of their telephone surveys asked how she was selected to be called. The interviewer advised her that her number came out of a computer. The indignant woman complained, "That's ridiculous! I have never, ever put my number into any computer!"
Write-in answers
May 8. 2017
Tara J. Abrams of Columbia House reports mail studies she used to conduct in the pharmaceutical field, where physicians were asked, "In what state do you practice?" Some of the write-in answers were: "Denial," "Confusion" and "Psychosis."
Paint or varnish
April 24, 2017
David Weiss of the National Decorating Products Association reports a mail survey he conducted where consumers were asked to indicate the most recent room where they used paint or a coating like varnish or sealer. Most consumers wrote in the conventional "living room" or "den" or "deck." One respondent, however, wrote in "casket."
Extra protein
April 10, 2017
Moderator Louise Kroot-Haukka reports conducting a group session with men where consumers had to taste a food product served in individual bowls. As they began eating, one man pointed out, "It’s moving!" Haukka thought the movement was simply liquid in the bowl, but then others in the group also noticed what turned out to be small bugs crawling in the bowls.
Soon, the discussion inevitably turned to the extra protein the product now contained. After Haukka explained that the bugs weren’t supposed to be there, the conversation went on as normal.
The men did cease tasting the product, however.
A bureaucratic government agency
March 27, 2017
Laurie Robertson of Robertson Communications recalls a telephone survey conducted by some bureaucratic government agency which included the following question, "How many people are there in your household broken down by sex?"
Dollar bill incentive
March 13, 2017
Jake McHugh tells about conducting an annual satisfaction study among members of the dental plan his company provided. One year they included a dollar bill as an incentive, together with a note reading, “At your next coffee break enjoy a beverage on us.” One respondent sent back a completed questionnaire along with the dollar bill and a note saying, “I’m now retired and no longer have a coffee break. So I’m returning the dollar.”
Is there such a thing as too much honesty?
All the boxes
February 20, 2017
Warren Weiss recalls a survey where, in response to the question, “Please check what level of education you’ve completed,” one bright Ph.D. checked all the boxes.
The client's stockings
February 6, 2017
Ron Gore reports a survey his interviewing service conducted for legal purposes in anti-embolism stockings. When visiting nurses and doctors who had previously agreed to be interviewed at their place of business, interviewers were supposed to show the two wooden legs they had been given, which were cloaked in the competitor’s and the client’s stockings. When Gore validated interviews, he found that one interviewer raised her skirt to display the products, one on each leg. It made much more sense to her for respondents to see the stockings on an actual person than on some artificial leg.
A deep Southern drawl
January 23, 2017
One computer engineer from Wappinger Falls, N.Y., reports getting a phone call from a company doing a survey about local issues. The female interviewer was reading the questionnaire verbatim, saying thing like, “As you know we’ve had a number of controversial political issues here in Wappinger Falls recently…”
The engineer, detecting something amiss since the interviewer had a deep Southern drawl, asked, “Where are you calling from?”
“Georgia,” was the reply.
“I thought so!”
“How could you tell?,” she asked.
“You talk slow,” he informed her.
What do you want to be when you grow up?
January 9, 2017
Art Shulman recalls back when his then six-year-old stepson made his day. During kindergarten graduation ceremonies, each of the children was asked what he or she wanted to be when they grew up. After hearing a slew of children choose policeman or fireman or teacher, it was refreshing to hear John unequivocally state, “I was to be a research guy.”
Turns out that rather than being intrigued by the conceptual issues of attitude measurement and sample development, John was intrigued by all the toy testing researchers do. When he grows up, he wants a job where he can play with toys all day. As far as John is concerned, that’s what market research is – playing with toys.
Boxers or briefs
December 19, 2016
Harris Goldstein reports he conducted a survey where the computer printout revealed a relatively high percentage of no answers when Canadian men were asked what type of underwear they wore – boxer shorts or briefs. Suspicious of the high number of no answers, Goldstein investigated further and found no interviewer or data processing errors. His conclusion: a relatively high percentage of Canadian men don’t wear underwear.
Curious about trunk space
December 5, 2016
Nancy Levine reports that in a ride-and-drive car study she conducted, a respondent who was curious about trunk space unscrewed his artificial leg and crawled into the trunk. Nancy resisted the temptation to shut the trunk behind him.
Door-to-door in the Midwest
November 21, 2016
Chuck Teaman of Strategic Alternatives of Florida tells about being a neophyte researcher who had occasion to accompany an interviewer door-to-door in sub-zero Midwestern weather on a home placement callback interview.
When the interviewer came to the overall rating question (a 5-point asymmetrical scale) and read the scale choices, the respondent answered, "I liked it fine," The interviewer said, "Oh, you mean excellent," promptly circled "Excellent" and went on to the next question.
Teaman didn’t want to interrupt so he spoke to the interviewer afterward, who assured him that, "Well, everybody knows 'fine’ means 'excellent’ in Peoria, Ill.!"
Red dye
November 7, 2016
Gail Fleenor related a story about a discussion on meat departments at various supermarket chains which led to an amazing discovery. When group participants were discussing how they choose meat, it turned out that color was a popular decision factor. One woman pooh-poohed this factor. "You know that all stores put some kind of red dye liquid on the meat to make it that color, don’t you?" she said, in all sincerity.
When visiting a pharmacy
October 24, 2016
Ellen Karp recalls working on a project concerning AIDS. In preparation for upcoming interviewing, she visited a pharmacy, which happened to be very busy at the time, to purchase a large number of condoms. In the aisle displaying the condoms, she merrily selected a wide variety of product, placing it in her basket as other shoppers either admired her with smiles or threw her disdainful looks.
Once she reached the checkout line, again the nearby shoppers noticed what was in her basket and either smiled or sneered, as Karp, thinking of her project, told them "busy weekend coming up."
At last she was checked through and gave the checker a personal credit card. Then, realizing that she was buying the condoms for a project, she took out a different credit card, one she used for business, and exclaimed "No, give me that card back. Use this one. This is a business expense!"
A hush descended over Karp’s checkout line.
'Reh-cord sex'
October 10, 2016
Moderator Saul Cohen reports that just prior to a focus group session with a new client not versed in market research he was going over the screener when she exclaimed, “I can’t wait to see this focus group.” When Cohen asked why, she pointed to the bottom of the screener and said, “Record sex,” except she pronounced it “Reh-cord sex.”
Personalized faucet handles
September 26, 2016
Tradeoff Marketing’s Harris Goldstein reports about a business trip to Florida. Goldstein had a wealthy cousin named Harry Chernin who lived in Chicago, but kept an apartment in Miami. When Goldstein old Chernin where he was going, his cousin volunteered his unused apartment to Goldstein and his wife for their stay. When they arrived at the apartment, they found it was decorated far more elaborately than they’d imagined.
As Goldstein’s wife discovered,even the bathroom was luxurious. After taking a look around, she called Goldstein in to marvel at its appointments. "Look!"she exclaimed. "Your cousin is so wealthy that he has personalized faucet handles. They’re embossed with his initials."
Goldstein looked at the handles. Sure enough, the one on the left was embossed with an "H" and the one on the right was embossed with a "C."