Successfully planning central location tests - April 2009

The term “central location test” refers to consumer tests conducted in specially adapted facilities in convenient locations where larger groups of people can be gathered. This type of testing is usually used for research into new or modified products, though it also finds successful application in testing advertising or packaging materials – in other words, in any case where direct contact with the item under research is necessary. Central location tests employ both traditional – quantitative and qualitative – research techniques, as well as modern visual techniques involving monitoring of respondents’ eye movements with specialist apparatus (“eye-tracking”), and testing for degree of recall of particular elements of an image by displaying it for a very short time (“t-scope”).