Information Resources Team Wins Prestigious O'Dell Marketing Award; American Marketing Association Cites Ground-Breaking Research On TV Advertising

Business Wire, August 16, 2000

Business Editors

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--August 16, 2000

Information Resources, Inc. (Nasdaq:IRIC) announced today that a team of researchers led by IRI board member Leonard M. Lodish won the American Marketing Association's (AMA) 2000 William F. O'Dell Award for a ground-breaking article on the effectiveness of television advertising.

The award-winning article, "How TV Advertising Works: A Meta-Analysis of 389 Real World Split Cable TV Advertising Experiments," was published in the May 1995 issue of the AMA's Journal of Marketing Research. The article was authored by Dr. Lodish and Magid Abraham, Stuart Kalmenson, Jeanne Livelsberger, Beth Lubetkin, Bruce Richardson, and Mary Ellen Stevens. The recipients received the award at the AMA's 2000 Summer Marketing Educators' Conference in August.

The O'Dell Award is given annually for the Journal of Marketing Research article that has made the most significant long-term contribution to marketing. To ensure their long-term impact, papers must have been published five years previously to be eligible for the award.

"I would like to congratulate Len Lodish and the other authors on winning this award," IRI Chairman, President and CEO Joe Durrett said. "Their work demonstrates IRI's ability to combine a deep reservoir of data with expert insights into consumer behavior to help companies make better marketing decisions."

The article analyzed results of 389 IRI BehaviorScan(R) tests, including matched household, consumer panel, split cable, copy, and real world TV advertising weight, as well as questionnaires to test common beliefs about how TV advertising works. Among other things, the IRI team found that, in general, increasing advertising budgets in relation to competitors' budgets does not increase sales. The authors found, however, that for categories where in-store merchandising is low, changing brand, copy, and media strategy increases the likelihood of television advertising positively affecting sales.

Information Resources, Inc. is a leading provider of UPC scanner-based business solutions to the consumer packaged goods industry, offering services in the U.S., Europe and other international markets. The Company supplies CPG manufacturers, retailers and brokers with information and analysis critical to their sales, marketing and supply chain operations. IRI provides services designed to deliver value through an enhanced understanding of the consumer to a majority of the Fortune 500 companies in the CPG industry.