SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
If your company’s focus is on the retail industry, you know the most important element to focus your efforts on is understanding the consumer! Retail is a large segment within the market research industry, and when you are looking to connect with potential customers, it is important to have a solid understanding of the various segments, everything from age and in-come to location and gender.
Shopper insights can provide you an up-close and personal look at how shoppers behave in-store, showing you how consumers shop, what they shop for, how much they spend and much more. When it comes to ways to gain insights, there are many methods to choose from, and the right shopper insights company can offer you the best option for your research project. Your shopper insights study can include more traditional methods like surveys and panels; newer, high-tech methods such as eye-tracking, virtual shopping and 3-D shopping simulations; or a combination of both. No matter what methods you turn to when looking to better understand consumers, the following companies can offer you the tools needed to gain valuable insights. Here is a list of 23 marketing research companies that offer shopper insight services.
Ann Michaels Ltd.
Founded 1998 | 11 employees
Kathy Doering, CEO
Customer experience management firm assisting clients with customer loyalty, consumer online sentiment analysis, competitive intelligence, brand awareness, customer satisfaction and customer experience measurement. Today’s consumer has higher expectations, a larger reach and a louder voice. Keeping up with it all can be challenging, even for the most customer-centric company. That’s where we come in. Our customer experience measurement programs allow us to listen, engage and monitor the customer experience across all channels.
Phone 866-703-8238
www.annmichaelsltd.com
BARE International
Founded 1987 | 352 employees
Dale Bare, CEO
BARE International sets the industry standard as the largest independent provider of customer experience research, data and analytics for companies worldwide. We provide customized research solutions for your unique business needs. Founded in 1987, BARE International is a family-owned business with global capabilities. With headquarters in the Washington, D.C., area and nine offices around the world, on a daily basis we are doing business for clients in more than 150 countries, completing more than 50,000 evaluations/audits each month. Our customer experience research services can help you see your business through your customers’ eyes and impact your bottom line.
Phone 703-593-8970
www.bareinternational.com
BestMark
Founded in 1986 | 200+ employees
Ann Jennings, CEO
Today’s companies require precise, timely insights to respond to marketplace course corrections, anticipate unforeseen disruptions and stay on the cutting edge. This means you need a powerful, agile partner who provides heads-up, on-your-toes and immediate feedback based on your multichannel experiences. For 30+ years, Best-Mark has partnered with the world’s greatest companies to help them anticipate shifting and emerging trends to stay on top and ahead of the curve. Feedback and analysis is what we are known for. Some of our services include: mystery shopping; mobile surveys; competitive intelligence; auditing; customer feedback; and any other field service. Fast facts: 15+ million evaluations completed; 600,000+ field reps; mobile and Web surveying; 24/7 analytics and reporting.
Phone 952-922-2205
www.bestmark.com
Brädo Creative Insight
Founded 1998 | 44 employees
Steve Nollau, President and Chief Strategy Officer
Bob Cuneo, President and Chief Creative Officer
Shopping happens fast. And shelves are crowded. There’s no time for nuance. But that doesn’t mean there is no time for insight. In fact, we believe shopper insight must be elevated to establish empathy and emotion in the scenarios of urgency and parity. Brand equity messages and reasons to buy are not enough. Insight, a fresh, deeper understanding of the shopper, must be achieved to transcend price. Differentiate from competition. And close sales. Brädo Creative Insight is a strategic market research agency specializing in qualitative shopper market research. We help clients achieve and leverage insight in shopper marketing and communications.
Phone 314-621-9499
www.brado.net
Canadian Viewpoint Inc.
Founded 1980 | 50 employees
Carol Udell, CEO
Canadian Viewpoint is a multimode, quantitative field firm with 35+ years of experience in the marketing research industry. Our data collection field services include the use of our proprietary Canadian consumer (~300,000) and medical (~15,000) panels and we offer services ranging from on-site to online. We do face-to-face (intercept/mall, taste/pack test, exit interviews, etc.), CATI (in-house phone center), IHUTs and online fieldwork. We have helped clients evaluate employee performance and customer service quality with our on-site services and mystery shopping for 25+ years. At Canadian Viewpoint, we pride ourselves at providing innovative, efficient and quality data collection fieldwork services.
Phone 905-770-1770
canview.com
Civicom Marketing Research Services
Founded 2000 | 350 employees
Rebecca West, Global VP, Marketing Research Services
Civicom ThoughtLight™ is a qualitative mobile app for collecting richer in-the-moment insights. Respondents can capture and send video, audio, photos and text responses for your assigned activities. The Civicom Thought-Light™ app is a useful tool for shopper insights, audio diaries, patient journeys, on-the-spot data collection and helpful in any situation where a researcher wants to engage with participants to gather data and feedback through the use of participant smartphones. Civicom ThoughtLight™ includes GPS, geolocation and offline accessibility for locations without a data connection. It is compatible with iOS and Android and available on the App Store and through Google Play.
Phone 203-413-2423
www.civicommrs.com
Confero Inc.
Founded 1986 | 48 employees
Elaine Buxton, CEO
Confero is a leading provider of data-driven, actionable shopper insights research and consulting. Mobile and analytic reporting tools, along with a 200,000+ field force of mystery shoppers, help clients discover any aspect of the in-store or on-premise experience. Discover roadblocks at retail, CPG-retailer-shopper disconnects and those hard-to-identify shopper pain points along the path-to-purchase. Example projects include wayfinding studies, omnichannel “BOPIS” shopper experience competitor studies, point-of-purchase promotion checks in-store and brand presence at retail. Confero’s award-winning project team has extensive experience working with manufacturers, CPG, retail, food service, beverage, grocery, travel, tourism and health care clients.
Phone 800-326-3880
www.conferoinc.com
Creative Consumer Research
Founded 1976 | 76 employees
Patricia Pratt, CEO
For 40 years CCR’s mission has been to provide clients accurate and actionable information to develop strategic solutions. This includes having an expertise in mystery shops, on-site interviewing, in-store intercepts and store audits on a national level. Our in-house staff can handle every aspect of any research project. CCR’s capabilities encompass superior data collection and extend to precise data cleaning, insightful analysis and professional presentation. CCR has partnered within a variety of industries including health care, automotive, consumer goods and education. So, if you’re looking for an experienced research partner, contact CCR.
Phone 281-240-9646
www.ccrsurveys.com
Gold Research Inc.
Founded 2006 | 2,500+ surveyors
Nitin Sharma, CEO
Gold Intercepts™: We guarantee Real-Time Certified Surveys from Credentialed Surveyors™. We specialize in customer satisfaction research, exit interviews, audits and mobile surveys, anywhere in U.S. or Canada. Gold Journey Mapping™: Our customized journey maps display customers’ entire paths-to-purchase by segment (and channels) to help you make targeted improvements and impact buyers positively. Gold Research-Support™: We offer survey programming, data processing, report development and project management so you can focus on more critical tasks. Gold Full Service™: Satisfaction research, concept testing and marketing/ad testing. We specialize in collecting the right insights needed to help take your business to the next level.
Phone 800-549-7170
www.goldresearchinc.com
Informed Decisions Group Inc.
Founded 2004 | 13 employees
Colin Valdiserri, CEO
Informed Decisions Group Inc. is a full-service behavioral insights firm specializing in shopper insights, visual sciences and conversion measurement. As the first company to successfully model purchase behavior to visual attention, IDG has innovated mobile eye-tracking solutions for shelf insights, package optimization and virtual shopping for over a decade. Our approach leverages an in-house quantitative and qualitative fusion with the most innovative technologies in life-sized virtual shopping, visual and emotional measurement including micro-expression coding and neuro-measurement. Since 2004, IDG’s clients have benefited from our teams’ unique backgrounds in consumer psychology and decades of experience in the behavioral sciences.
Phone 440-454-0399
www.idg-consulting.com
IntelliShop
Founded 1999 | 186 employees
Ron Welty, CEO
IntelliShop partners with clients and research firms to deliver customer experience research solutions for every touchpoint. For research firms, whitelisting our services and Web portal (InSite™) allows you to maintain your brand presence with your clients. Our panel of more than 1 million shoppers can reach any geographic location quickly and efficiently for a variety of projects. We combine the most innovative Web-based intelligence and analytics platform with our team of exceptional people to provide you with a level of expertise and extreme service that is unmatched.
Phone 419-872-5103
www.intelli-shop.com
Ipsos Loyalty
Founded 1975 | 16,000+ employees
Nick Mercurio, SVP and Head of Mystery Shopping
Ipsos ranks third in the global market research industry and is a true leader in mystery shopping and shopper insights. Ipsos Loyalty conducts over 1.2 million mystery shops annually for blue-chip companies in the retail, restaurant, CPG, technology, financial services and automotive sectors. With a presence in 87 countries, Ipsos employs more than 16,000 people and has the ability to conduct research programs in more than 100 countries. Founded in France in 1975, Ipsos Loyalty is the trusted advisor to top executives of the world’s leading enterprises across industry sectors on all matters relating to measuring, modeling and managing customer and employee relationships.
Phone 425-586-5570
www.ipsosloyalty.com
Mintel International
Founded 1972
Peter Haigh, CEO
Mintel is the world’s leading market intelligence agency. For over 40 years, Mintel’s expert analysis of the highest quality data and market research has directly impacted on client success. With offices in London, Chicago, Bel-fast, Kuala Lumpur, Mumbai, Munich, New York, São Paulo, Shanghai, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo and Toronto, Mintel has forged a unique reputation as a world-renowned business brand. For more information on Mintel, please visit www.mintel.com.
Phone 312-932-0400
www.mintel.com
Mystery Shopper Services
Founded 1996 | 19 employees
Charles Stiles, CEO
Mystery Shopper Services is a full-service international market research and guest satisfaction company. With nearly 1 million shoppers, we specialize in delivering actionable information in a very intuitive format for nearly every industry, including some of the world’s leading market research companies. Our 60 years of combined experience has taught us what is important with today’s consumers, and we layer that in with the client’s non-negotiable service standards. Those standards can be measured in several different ways, such as mystery shops, market audits and competition studies, crowdsourced solutions and video mystery shopping. We also track the pulse of your existing customer base through social media tracking, comment cards and guest satisfaction surveys.
Phone 888-300-8292
www.mysteryshopperservices.com
The Olinger Group Inc.
Founded 1994 | 10 employees
Jude A. Olinger, CEO
The Olinger Group is a national leader in providing full-service, on-site research services which include shopper insight studies and intercept interviews. The Olinger Group leverages its nationwide “know-and-trust” network of over 600 trained intercept interviewers (exclusive to our firm) who are managed by our in-house staff using processes and procedures refined over numerous projects to provide a best-in-class experience for clients and their customers. Our experience con-ducting on-site research includes retail locations, restaurants, events, festivals, conferences and trade shows.
Phone 504-208-4300
www.olingergroup.com
PRS IN VIVO
Founded 1972 | 300 employees
Scott Young, Global CEO
PRS IN VIVO is the world’s leading research firm applying behavioral economics to packaging, shopper and new product research. We focus on what people do, rather than what they say, knowing that real-life purchase decisions are overwhelmingly behavioral (“thinking fast”), rather than rational (“thinking slow”) – and greatly influenced by context. These principles inform all our methodologies, emphasizing shoppers’ behavior and purchase selections and confirming that brands are seen, understood and shop-able at-shelf. We also have unique offerings to understand, document and predict shopper behavior, including a global network of 20+ ShopperLabs® and unmatched scope, database and expertise in eye-tracking.
Phone 201-346-1600
www.prs-invivo.com
Second To None Inc.
Founded 1989 | 65 employees
Jeff Hall, CEO
As a leading customer experience research agency, Second To None helps brands across North America deliver consistent, intentional and authentic consumer experiences. We are experts in customer touchpoint mystery shopping, voice of customer surveys and shopper insight studies. Solutions are end-to-end, from design through analytics, grounded in solid statistical science and strategic relevance. Our clients leverage assessments of operational standards with voice of customer feedback surveys and shopper insights for a distinct competitive advantage. Our work delivers transformative insight along with clear priorities, allowing clients to take action, effect positive change and drive improved business performance throughout their organization.
Phone 734-302-8400
www.secondtonone.com
Secret Shopper
Founded 1990 | 50 employees
Paul F. Ryan, CEO
At the core of Secret Shopper® is our expertise in evaluating the customer experience both in the digital and brick-and-mortar worlds. Secret Shopper® focuses on evaluating every step of the customer experience journey by evaluating our clients’ online, on-site and over-the-phone customer engagements. Millions of secret shoppers have registered on our Web site and performed evaluations across the globe. Secret Shopper® has the right innovative in-house team to support your product launch, merchandising needs or build an ongoing mystery shop-ping program. Our Minneapolis Web development team has the expertise to unleash your cutting-edge online presence while driving digital success. Come visit our Web site www.secretshopper.com to learn more and get started.
Phone 763-525-1460
www.secretshopper.com
The Sentry Marketing Group LLC
Founded 2005 | 13 employees
David Agius, CEO
Sentry is a national customer analytics company based in Plano, Texas. We specialize in the design and management of mystery shopping and survey programs for business ranging from local chains to national brands. Sentry’s reputation for delivering industry-best reports is the result of our commitment to base each program on the clients’ specific needs, operating guidelines and organizational philosophy. Our integrated platform allows for mystery shopping and survey results to be delivered on the same platform. The result is a powerful business intelligence tool that allows our clients to improve customer loyalty and increase profits.
Phone 972-987-1696
www.sentrymarketing.com
Service Evaluation Concepts Inc. (SEC)
Founded 1987 | 22 employees
Arcadio Roselli, CEO
With over 27 years of experience, we at Service Evaluation Concepts Inc. (SEC) have built a unique research concept that has worldwide reach. We uniquely help to translate strategy into action using a global panel of over 650,000 brand agents (certified research participants) and our proprietary enterprise feedback management system. Our brand agents operate as undercover CEOs (mystery shoppers), empowering brands to measure the human dimension of the designed customer experience (employees and customers) to maximize conversion and maximize advertising. SEC validates return on investment by using cause-and-effect linkage that clearly positively impacts the corresponding financial key performance indicators.
Phone 516-576-1188 ext. 3530
www.serviceevaluation.com
SIS International Research
Founded 1984 | 75 employees
Ruth Stanat, CEO
SIS International Research is a global market research and strategic market intelligence company providing mystery shopping, market intelligence, sensory research, big data solutions, qualitative fieldwork and quantitative data collection. Our mystery shopping services include product research, customer service experience re-search, retail research/audits and competitive pricing shops. Our headquarters is located in New York and our other key regional offices include London, Frankfurt, Shanghai, Seoul and Manila. SIS-SQREEM, our new big data methodology, applies sophisticated algorithms to extract insights from multiple layers of data collection. SIS also owns a focus group facility in the heart of Manhattan’s Flatiron District in NYC.
Phone 212-505-6805
www.sismarketresearch.com
SmartRevenue
Founded 2000 | 31 employees
John Dranow, CEO
SMARTREVENUE is your eyes and ears at the point-of-purchase, experience and consumption, at-home, in public, in-store and in digital, anywhere in the world. As the leading provider of shopper insights, strategies and solu-tions, SMARTREVENUE delivers best-in-class insights by leveraging the largest global field force of ethnographers to observe and interview shoppers along the path-to-purchase. SMARTREVENUE has conducted over 1,000,000 observations and interviews in 107 categories across 190 retail banners in the U.S., Canada, Latin America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. We’ve developed proprietary models – including Quantitative Ethnography™ and Shopper Decision Trees – that produce actionable insights for marketing, merchandising, sales and innovation.
Phone 763-561-0716
www.smartrevenue.com
SSI (Survey Sampling International)
Founded 1977 | 4,000+ employees
Chris Fanning, President and CEO
SSI is the premier global provider of data solutions and technology for consumer and business-to-business survey research. SSI reaches participants in 90+ sample countries via Internet, telephone, mobile/wireless and mixed-access offerings. SSI staff operates from 40 offices and remote staff in 20 countries, offering sample, data collection, CATI, questionnaire design consultation, programming and hosting, online custom reporting and data processing. SSI’s 4,000+ employees serve more than 3,000 clients worldwide.
Phone 203-567-7200
www.surveysampling.com
TrendSource
Founded 1989 | 86 employees
Jim Caltrider, CEO
For over 25 years, TrendSource has been the leading provider of mystery shopping and market research pro-grams. Whether you’re looking to identify service gaps between customers’ expectations and their experiences or understand key behaviors that will drive sales and customer loyalty, TrendSource has the expertise to deliver actionable results to achieve your objectives. Our quantitative and qualitative solutions will provide you with the necessary insights that will impact your customers’ buying behaviors.
Phone 619-718-7467
trustedinsight.trendsource.com
Visit Shopper Insights, Consumer Research and Consumer Industry for a complete list of companies offering these services.