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Beaumont popular target for test marketingJun 27, 2010 (The Beaumont Enterprise - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Twenty-four hour shopping. Putting a leash on bandwidth hogs. Bins in which to toss crumpled cans. TV watchers wanting not just to see what's on, but also what else is on. If it's in a consumer's hands, or is leaving a consumer's hands in the case of recycling, it's likely the result of test marketing. And for some reason, Beaumont is a good place to test. "There isn't a big fluctuation in residents," said Gary Underwood, a spokesman for Time Warner Cable, the major provider of cable television in Southeast Texas and the provider of the RoadRunner Internet service. "It's not like South Texas where there are a lot of winter residents (who leave in the summer.) So (the market) is stable," Underwood said. "We can get accurate data." Time Warner Cable tested an interactive program guide for digital television subscribers in Beaumont. It's an expected feature now. The company also began what turned into a controversial testing of metered bandwidth usage to help it craft a way to charge heavy users. AT&T followed suit, using Beaumont, as well as Reno, Nev., as test markets. "It's not atall uncommon for markets that size with stable customer bases to be used for a test," Underwood said. Mike Barger, a spokesman for AT&T, told The Enterprise the company considered Beaumont and Reno as good representatives of other markets around the country. Reno has a population of about 218,000 people and is near Sparks, Nev., with 90,000 residents in western Nevada. "They were good places to do it," Barger said. He said AT&T was aware of Time Warner Cable's market trial for its Internet service in Beaumont, but said AT&T's selection of Beaumont was independent of it. "We selected Beaumont as a good representative of our markets," Barger said. Tests aren't just to see how much a company can charge. Sometimes, it is customer service. In November 1993, after Walmart considered Beaumont for a 24-hour store, a local store manager remarked on the nature of the customer base in an Enterprise article. "It's amazing how this town has turned into a 24hour city. "There are so many workers who work at night that can't shop at the store during the day," the manager said in the 1993 article. And that was for the Walmart location that was on Eastex Freeway south of Lucas Drive -- before the Supercenter was built on Dowlen Road. When that store opened in January 1996, the 24-hour shopping cycle was an established practice. To see more of The Beaumont Enterprise, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.www.beaumontenterprise.com/. Copyright (c) 2010, The Beaumont Enterprise, Texas Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit www.mctinfoservices.com, e-mail [email protected], or call 866-280-5210 (outside the United States, call +1 312-222-4544). |