Bottled water

The term market research is the “systematic problem analysis, model building and fact finding for the purposes of improved decision making in the marketing of goods and services”, this basically means that through research companies are going to try and give customers what they want. In my assignment I too will use market research, and will be carrying out a research on bottled water. I intend to find out how pupils of my school feel about the idea of bottled water, and how the feel about certain brands, flavours etc.

I also would hope to explain why bottled water has become the success it has, and why pupils of my school prefer it to a bottle filled with ordinary tap water. I have decided to use a questionnaire as part of my primary research. The questionnaire will set out to investigate our schools knowledge of water and we’ll see how many people are consuming it daily. Through the questionnaires I will discover various different aspects in order to find out if it affects the market positively or negatively.

Primary Research is a type of data which you find yourself albeit through…* Discussions with people* Direct observation* Questionnaires and surveys* Sampling* Testing through pilot and field trialsFor my research I have decided to use the questionnaires and surveys method, combined with a method of sampling. This is to ensure the complete reliability of my research. I have chosen these methods mainly due to the fact that the project is based in school, therefore I must select the quickest methods available, this however will not deflect from the amount of effort needed in order to compile the questionnaire and to distribute them to the correct people.

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The two main types of data are collected by market research are…* Quantitative – This is generally numerical data, E.g. Statistics. This kind of data is collected using questionnaires and surveys* Qualitative – This kind of data where people give ideas, this research is used most significantly for investigation purposes, E.g. Why people are buying a certain productI previously said I would be using a method of sampling, but first I would like to explain what sampling is. Basic sampling is a representation of a large body by a smaller body. The advantages of this are that the company saves much more time, and it gives them the opinions of their customers. However the downside is this, not all people may have the same opinion, this therefore means that they won’t get their say as to how the company produce its goods. It is important with sampling that enough people are chosen to give confidence in the result. A sample size can be as low as 100 but obviously the more people asked, the more accurate the result obtained is.Here are the various different methods of Sampling:* Stratified Samples – Choosing people from a specific group in the population.* Quota Samples – Selected on the basis of the characteristics of customer profile.* Cluster Samples – People are chosen from a specific area.* Systematic Samples – Every Nth person within a group is chosen.* Random Samples – Everyone has an equal chance of being picked.Of course, it is possible for an incorrect result from a questionnaire, this is could happen because of the wrong type of sample chosen or even because of poor facts and statistics. When compiling a question you should always…* Show clarity and purpose to your enquiry* Show understanding to all sides of community; try to word questions so that everyone can understand.* Avoid misleading questions.* Good presentation and structure.The questionnaire is going to be made up of around 8 or 9 questions, and in it, it will include questions such as,”Where do you buy your water?””How much do you spend on water per week?””Is water your preferred drink now?””Is drinking water really healthy?”Of course these are only example questions and I would expect to have varied them a little in my final questionnaire.To start of compiling my questionnaire I firstly drew up a rough page of ideas then begun work on Microsoft Pin point. Here I was able to lay down a question, and provide boxes for the reader to tick. I decided that a basic lay out was needed, so I ended up having a page with a border around, inset was the text of questions asking pupils about bottled water. The questionnaire had various different changes to be made, mostly because of the amount of space to provide for pupils to give their own ideas. Also the font was changed quite a bit from the original. After all the nit picking my questionnaire was finally ready, the next stage was the sampling. I decided that random selection was the fairest method so I randomly picked out two boys, and two girls from each class and stopped when I had reached a desired total. I handed them out to the selected people. Each of them filled out the questionnaire and gave it back to me. I then programmed all of my results into the computer.In order to get a clear view of each opinion I decided that graphs, pie charts would be the fastest and easiest way to access the information. All graphs and a copy of the questionnaire are printed on separate pages. There are 3 graphs in total, the first graph is outlining the most popular flavour of water, graph two is outlining the most popular brand of water and the final graph is showing the results for how often water is drunk/purchased by the pupils of Castlederg high school. Overall there were no surprising results.GRAPH ONE – This graph showed that the most popular water was “flavoured water”. It had around 43% of the vote; still water was second with 30% with sparkling water third on 27%.GRAPH TWO – This showed river rock as the most popular brand with almost half of the votes.GRAPH THREE – This showed the popularity of water when everyone said they drink water often or at least on a regular basis, no one said that they never drunk water.Secondary research is data, which is published, either on hard copy or through an electronic source, which has been picked up by others for their own use. This kind of data must be taken with care, after all it is data, which has been used for a different purpose, and this may have affected the data analysis and presentation. When using secondary research companies should find out…* Whether source is accurate* TrustworthyThere are various kinds of secondary research, desk research is a quicker method than field research, and it is also less expensive. However the problem is that findings are not as accurate as field research. Secondary research can be obtained from internal or external sources.The different forms of external research are:* Government statistics* Media* The internet* Market research companies such as key note, retail business* Market surveysThe different forms of internal are:* Databases of computers* Sales invoices* Complaint letters* Sales information* Financial informationExternal is probably a more important method of research as it doesn’t affect the companies’ performance to its competitors, but internal offers a snapshot view of the company as a whole and is information that is already held within the company. I have used external, mainly because of Internet research. Through external research I was able to go through different companies websites and find out information on their water. Classic water is used within our school and although it is a popular seller, the pupils decided that river rock was their favourite bottled waterIn conclusion I feel that my research into bottled as went well, and have answered the questions I initially asked, why has it become more popular? The reason being pupils of my school think it is a healthy way of living. My results have shown many things, in particular the popularity of river rock within our school. Also showing that flavoured water is most preferred kind of bottled war.Need help on conclusion, don’t know what to write!