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!
Sometimes clients can be scary to respondents, even if they don’t mean to be. Tony Memoli of Chase Manhattan Bank tells about some group sessions he attended a few years ago. He and his fellow clients in the back room had just finished eating sushi, and even though the group wasn’t anywhere near done, one of his colleagues had dozed off on the couch.
Suddenly, the door to the back room opened, and in stepped one of the young panelists, who had chosen the wrong door while on her way back to the session from the ladies room.
What she encountered stunned her - darkness, the smell of raw fish, snoring, and voices bellowing over the loudspeakers. When she found her way back to the focus group, she didn’t say a word for the rest of the night.
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