At a glance, our name, International Creative Marketing, may not seem like that of Japanese marketing research company; in fact, however, we are an ordinary Japanese company, specialising in ad hoc marketing research. When I formed this company, one of my goals was to provide our service to foreign-affiliated and other internationally -oriented companies: hence the word, "International". The "Creative" was added because I wanted our company to bring creative, original thinking into its planning and reporting.

This way of thinking had its basis in my own personal background: from 1961-72, I worked at A.C.Nielsen Company, which at the time was the largest marketing research company in the world. I was in charge of dealings with foreign-affiliated clients, who placed a lot of importance on the gathering of information about the Japanese market --more so than Japanese companies did at the time. When A.C.Nielsen Japan was formed, the company's original founder, Arthur C. Nielsen, came to Japan himself and taught us, the new Japanese staff, about the philosophy of international market research. In 1972, I left Nielsen and started, with a partner, an ad hoc research company mainly targeting foreign-affiliated manufacturers. Eight years later, in 1981, I left my partner and formed this company. Thus, among the clients that ICM provides its service to, there are some that I have been dealing with for over 25 years.

Surviving as a company in these though economic times is no easy task; and this is particularly the case in the marketing research companies are falling under the control of large corporations in possession of a worldwide research network. Given this environment, I think our company's raison d'etre is that it maintains a client-centred approach; and I am confident that because of this approach, we are able to meet our clients' needs more quickly and flexibly than other, large-scale companies.

Shogo Matsui
President
International Creative Marketing