Yugoslavia nowadays has a powerful textile and garments industry which is relatively evenly spread throughout her territory and which unites more than a hundred years of experience on the one hand, and energy and initiative of a young industry on the other. Recent developments in this industry have been in the function of domestic demand and exports. Domestic demand, in its turn, is determined primarily by the standard of living and structural changes in personal consumption.
The objective of this paper is to examine the character of market research in the CMEA countries by comparing it with those of the western market economy and Arab countries. The leading idea for the examination is that the planning system of a country has a distinct influence upon import decision making and through this on the character of market research used. In this paper the character of market research is described by means of the main types of research, information sources and information types.
In the paper there is presented the theoretical concept of a Marketing Information System integrating the activity of industry and distribution, that can work in a planned socialistic economy. The concept includes the methodological principles as well as the informational structure of system. Because one of the principles says that MIS can exist only with the support of automated data processing techniques, the basic organizational-technical conditions of its activity are presented here too.
The emergence of the project of integrated research in the socialist countries is closely linked to multilateral cooperation between the CMEA countries, and to the urgent need to improve the management control and planning activities of the bearers of external economic relations in those countries. Essentially, integrated research is an analogy of Western multi-country research, but its practical shape and theoretical justification are the result of the specific socio-economic climate conducive to its application in the socialist countries. The author describes both the obstacles and the stimuli to the application of integrated research, without analysing any of them in detail.
The paper begins by emphasising the new aspects of corporate planning and mentions, that every industrial undertaking has yearly and medium-degree plans, but long-range plans are elaborated rather for industrial branches and for the people's economy as a whole. Considering the marketing impacts, which has a determined role in the environment of regulated socialist market, is a very important and new factor in the making of both of medium-range and yearly plans.
In a planned economy, market research is not only a means of market information used by producing and commercial enterprises, but is an indispensable factor for the formulation of plans for the national economy and for supervision of the fulfilment of plans. Consequently, two separate branches of market research have developed in the Central and Eastern European socialist countries over the past decades.
After defining the concept of distribution and its place in marketing the author has presented the role of trade in Poland's economy. Then he discusses the channels of distribution, structure and organisation of retail and wholesale trade as well as basic directions of trade policy. We witness a rapid process of concentration and integration as well as modernisation of trade. In the further part of the paper conditions of distribution system functioning have been reviewed and characterised. The reforms introduced in the distribution system aim at increasing the enterprise adaptability to market situations, simplification (rationalisation) of distribution channels and creating premises for employing the active marketing strategy.
It is our aim to illustrate the goals of market investigations, seen from the viewpoint of possibilities for encouraging the continuous development of the Yugoslav economy.
The paper covers five "planned economy" countries. While significant differences exist among these countries, the considerations that justify the investigation of the choice of media on a regional basis, apply to them equally. Due to the relatively low volume of advertising, media research is generally still in its infancy. The special features of media selection due to the characteristics of the socialist planned economy, exist less in the methods and techniques than in the analysis and interpretation of the data.
The realisation of the importance of the market and of market research is of relatively recent origin in the socialist Countries. The need had been shown even under the highly centralised system of a planned economy which relied mainly on 19 planning instructions, but only in relatively narrow fields, and appeared only when these concrete instructions concerning the specification of output began to lose their importance and the assignment of compulsory buyers became reduced in scope. As a consequence, there is as yet no sufficient practical experience available, research of the socialist market has as yet not acquired the past which would enable the formulation of a theory and the elaboration of satisfactory practical methods, scientifically founded in every respect.
According to the researches performed up to now may be seen that the results of such and similar inquiries may very efficiently contribute to making such decisions (measures) which will influence upon the recovery of economic trends and improvement of market situation. With regard to the experiences gained by previous inquiries smaller sampling of enterprises should be made in future, but their influence upon production of the special branch should be taken into account. Four inquiries per year should be made. The research results illustrate a very significant differentiation in the operation of the enterprises under economic reform. In addition to several (many) technological factors, the prosperity of the enterprises is also influenced frequently by such factors as: organization, business policy and staff situation especially
This paper shows not only the development of the retail trade in Slovenia as a consequence of rapid urbanisation but also some methods of research work and their application to the field of the spatial distribution of retail establishments.