The Association for Qualitative Research
The Hub of Qualitative Excellence

Data collection under scrutiny

Esomar has been producing a set of Annual Statistics of the Marker Research industry for some years. The trend figures show an encouraging growth although the latest data suggests that the fastest growing sgment in Europe, in terms of methodologies, is continuous research at the expense of ad-hoc quantitative and qualitative.

Country Interviews Groups Depths
Austria 80,000 6% 94%
Belgium 45,000 62% 38%
Bulgaria 3,000 46% 54%
Czech Republic 8,000 - -
Denmark 10,000 84% 16%
Finland 6,000 87% 11%
Germany 111,000 18% 82%
Greece 35,000 87% 13%
Ireland 15,000 80% 20%
Luxembourg 300 83% 17%
Norway 10,000 - -
Portugal 5,000 50% 50%
Slovenia 500 73% 27%
Spain 111,000 71% 29%
Sweden 26,000 77% 23%
Switzerland 21,000 40% 60%
Turkey - 80% 20%
United Kingdom 174,000 71% 29%
European average   53% 47%

In terms of qualitative research, the 1994 data shows an interesting pattern. It suggests that in Austria, Germany, and to some extent Switzerland, fewer group discussions are conducted compared with in-depth interviews elsewhere, which may be partly explained by the terminology.

No data was available for France, Italy or the Netherlands.