Charles Coolidge Parlin (1872 – October 15, 1942) was the American "manager of the division of commercial research of the

Curtis Publishing Company The Curtis Publishing Company, founded in 1891 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, became one of the largest and most influential publishers in the United States during the early 20th century. The company's publications included the ''Ladies' Home Jour ...

" in charge of selling advertising spots in the ''

Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine, currently published six times a year. It was issued weekly under this title from 1897 until 1963, then every two weeks until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely c ...

''. He is credited as being the founder and a "pioneer" in the area of

market research Market research is an organized effort to gather information about target markets and customers: know about them, starting with who they are. It is an important component of business strategy and a major factor in maintaining competitiveness. Mark ...

Career

Parlin worked as a member of the

United States Food Administration The United States Food Administration (1917–1920) was an independent Federal agency that controlled the production, distribution and conservation of food in the U.S. during the nation's participation in World War I. It was established to preve ...

while it was run by

Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 and a member of the Republican Party, holding office during the onset of the Gr ...

during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

before becoming a schoolteacher in

De Pere, Wisconsin De Pere ( ) is a city located in Brown County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 25,410 according to the 2020 Census. De Pere is part of the Green Bay Metropolitan Statistical Area. History At the arrival of the first European, Je ...

. He would then move on to be the Principal of the Wausau Senior High School and concurrently as President of the Wisconsin State Teachers' Association. In 1911, he was hired by the Curtis Publishing Company in a job that had no clearly defined title, as the work he was doing had not previously been done. Parlin came up with the name "commercial research" for his work, which would later end up being changed to market research. The company had just bought out the magazine, ''

Country Gentleman ''The Country Gentleman'' (1852–1955) was an American agricultural magazine founded in 1852 in Albany, New York, by Luther Tucker.Frank Luther Mott (1938A History of American Magazines 1850–1865"The Country Gentleman", page 432, Harvard Unive ...

'', but the owner of the company,

Cyrus Hermann Kotzschmar Curtis Cyrus Hermann Kotzschmar Curtis (June 18, 1850June 7, 1933) was an American publisher of magazines and newspapers, including the ''Ladies' Home Journal'' and ''The Saturday Evening Post''.Ingham, John N. Biographical Dictionary of American Business ...

, had little knowledge about agriculture. Since much of the advertising in the ''Country Gentleman'' magazine was purchased by the agriculturalists, Parlin began researching agriculture in general. After six months of interviews with a number of people in the industry, he completed a 460-page survey that "revealed unsuspected facts about where agricultural tools were made, to whom they were sold, when, and where." After this, Parlin carried out a study on "the market for almost everything in the nation's one hundred largest cities," which involved 1,121 interviews across the nation, compiling all of the findings in order to draw conclusions about the workings of the national market. His "pioneer report", ''Department Store Lines'', was released in 1912 and it focused on the distinctions between convenience goods and shopping goods and how the marketer should focus on selling primarily shopping goods in order to obtain the highest profits. In 1914, Parlin released a five-volume study titled ''Automobiles''. It focused on the future of the automobile age and "collected facts on manufacturing and distribution, on the influence of women on automobile purchase". The study predicted correctly that the number of grades and makes would be reduced in the future and it "envisaged the dimensions and even the shape of the automobile market." This information resulted in an increase in advertising by automobile manufacturers, in order to obtain customers faster than their competitors in the burgeoning market for automobiles. Largely due to Parlin's success, other commercial organisations began creating Departments of Commercial Research including:

United States Rubber Company The company formerly known as the United States Rubber Company, now Uniroyal, is an American manufacturer of tires and other synthetic rubber-related products, as well as variety of items for military use, such as ammunition, explosives, chemi ...

in 1915 and

Swift and Company JBS USA Holdings, Inc. is an American food processing company and a wholly owned subsidiary of the multinational company JBS S.A. The subsidiary was created when JBS entered the U.S. market in 2007 with its purchase of Swift & Company. JBS speci ...

in 1916. Foreseeing a need for "standardized definitions and common measures" after the release of Parlin's studies, the

Audit Bureau of Circulations An Audit Bureau of Circulations is a private organization that provides industry-agreed standards for media brand measurement of print publications and other media outlets in a given country. The International Federation of Audit Bureaux of Circula ...

was formed in 1914 in order to regulate publisher's claims for newspaper and magazine circulations. During the 1920s, Parlin went on to found the "first commercial research company" with Donald M. Hobart, backed by the Curtis Publishing Company, called National Analysts. He began a new series of investigations in 1929 into the

aviation Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. ''Aircraft'' includes fixed-wing and rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-than-air craft such as hot air ...

industry and the importance of airplanes in the transportation of commercial products. The aviation report was released in April of 1930 and titled ''The Aviation Industry''. In it, he concluded that private airplane ownership would massively increase by 1940, a significant amount of long-distance mail will begin being sent via planes, and that the number of plane making companies and types of planes would be massively reduced due to expansion and competition. Parlin retired from the company in 1938 and was succeeded by Hobart.

Legacy

The ''Charles Coolidge Parlin Marketing Research Award'' was established in 1945 by "the Philadelphia Chapter of the AMA and The Wharton School in association with the Curtis Publishing Company to honor persons who have made outstanding contributions to the field of marketing research." It is meant to act as a memorial to Parlin, due to his creation of the field of market research.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Parlin, Charles Coolidge Marketing people Market research Market researchers American marketing people People from Wisconsin Educators from Wisconsin 1872 births 1942 deaths

Career

Legacy

See also

References