Market research pioneer Arthur C. Nielsen Jr., died this week, leaving a legacy that made his name synonymous with television ratings.
The 92 year old rose to run the company started by his father 88 years ago to revenue of more than $680 million. He was introduced to computers during his work in World War II when he constructed a building to house a computer. That building was used to calculate metrics for accurate firing of artillery guns. He recognized the value in this for the Nielsen Company which at that point was measuring sales for food and drug stores and some radio station audience measurements.
The company jumped into numerous markets including tracking subscription data for magazines and oil and gas wells and was a pioneer of scanning technology. However, the Nielsen name is best known in the media measurement world with a near monopoly in the television ratings arena.
A company retirement policy forced him out in 1983. The next year he helped structure the sale of Nielsen to Dun & Bradstreet for $1.3 billion in stock. Dutch publisher VNU has since bought it, but retained the well-known Nielsen name.
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RIP Arthur C. Nielsen Jr. Thank you for sharing, his way of business and life was an inspiration. I live in Utah and work for a company I love that does Contract Manufacturing and Arthur's passion has helped me to be more passionate about my work.
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