Editor’s note: "War Stories" is a regular feature in which Art Shulman, president of Shulman Research, Van Nuys, Calif., presents humorous stories of life in the research trenches.
An acquaintance of mine, relatively new to working in the market research profession, was curious about why so many surveys screen out people active in the profession. So she asked her boss, a man who’d been in the business for over 20 years, "Why are market researchers excluded from opinion surveys? Is it for reasons of security or confidentiality, or because researchers are familiar with the types of questions that might be asked and are therefore atypical?"
"Neither," he replied. "The reason is, as experienced market researchers, we know that the opinions of other market researchers aren’t worth a damn."
This is a true story. The experienced researcher declined to be identified for this column, explaining, "Listen, I have clients."
Joan Rogers of Mid-America Research tells of an interviewer working for her company who was doing door-to-door interviews, placing motor oil with households for an in-car test. She’d just given two cases of oil to a man when she realized that he was blind. "Sir, do you realize you’re blind?" she asked.
"Certainly," he replied.
When she began to stammer about whether he was really eligible to participate in the survey, he went on to inform her that he could tell when his oil needed changing by how it felt.
The interviewer, almost expecting him to ask if she’d like to go for a spin, instead left the oil with him. It turned out that the gentleman later completed the survey after using the oil. (Of course, someone else was the driver. At least that’s what the respondent told the research company during the callback interview.)
The same interviewer, working on a different study, reported placing a set of sharp European-made knives with a blind man. Turned out he was a blind butcher. Talk about the cutring edge of research!
Ben Pine of Pine Company recalls running into his old friend Herb, a CPA, at a tailgate party. Herb, appearing to be angry, asked Pine, "What makes you think my time is worth only $12 an hour?"
Turns out that, by chance, Herb had been randomly selected to receive a questionnaire mailed out by Pine’s company, with a dollar bill enclosed for "five minutes of your time just for filling out this questionnaire and mailing it in." The astute CPA had then mentally computed that there are 12 five-minute periods in an hour, which, when multiplied by $1, came out to $12 per hour.
Pine’s company sent a different questionnaire, together with a quarter, to an executive of The Franchise Tax Board, the tax collection agency for the State of California. Within a few days the quarter was returned along with a form letter which began, "We have received your payment but cannot accept if for the reason checked."
Unchecked were items such as, "The numerical and written amounts differ or the amount was not entered," and "Wrong payee. Make your check or money order payable to Franchise Tax Board." Instead, an "X" was typed in the "Other" space, and to the right was the note, "The State of California does not accept gratuities."
The State of California sure knows how to fill out forms.
This is the final installment of "War Stories." We are discontinuing the series due to reader complaints. We apologize to those who were offended by the content of past columns.