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!

Joel Reish was once conducting focus groups among young adults who listen to new-music radio stations. The client wanted to test their reactions to a special vehicle that the station could purchase that was designed to look like a giant compact disc.

Reish showed the group a picture in which the huge 15-foot-high disc was on a trailer hooked to a truck, with people standing in front and trees in the background. Reish explained to the group that it was a mock-up of a giant CD, and a radio station could bring it to remote events or parades and such, and the disc jockey could broadcast live from a booth inside the middle of it.

One earnest young woman squinted at it in confusion and then asked in all seriousness, "Can you play it?"


David Bauer reports going through the introductory remarks of a focus group he was conducting. When he got to the part where he told participants about the one-way mirror, he pointed behind him and said, "There are some people on my team sitting behind me." One of the participants looked at him as if he were crazy and said, "There’s no one behind you." Bauer couldn’t understand why she didn’t believe there were people behind him. Luckily for him, another respondent jumped in, saying, "He means that that is a one-way mirror with people sitting behind it."