Market Research in Colorado

Food & Drink Resources got its start in Virginia and Texas, back when co-founders Richard Keys and Scott Randolph based their work there. The move to Colorado in 2009 was an intentional business move. Denver doesn’t just have amazing weather, skiing, and restaurants. Turns out Colorado is an ideal spot for food/beverage market research, too.

The proof is in the fact that many multi-location restaurants have test stores in Denver, like McDonald’s.

Suburban Dining

If you’ve visited here, then you know there are a number of suburban areas rife with chain restaurants. Aurora, Lakewood, Brighton, Highlands Ranch, and the list of Denver suburban towns and cities goes on. We have found it is easier to recruit the kind of respondents we need from these suburban areas because residents likely eat at fast-casual and chain restaurants every week.

Colorado has no shortage of chain and fast-casual eateries. In fact, 20+ restaurant chains are based or got their start in Colorado. Some industry experts even call Denver the fast casual capital.

New York and California, where a lot of market research is done for food/drink as well as media and consumer goods, may have big, centrally-located populations to pull respondents from, but the population is not indicative of the rest of the country. When choosing participants for a market research project, you want a sample that’s going to represent the bulk of your customers. In FDR’s case, that’s regular customers of chain restaurants. 

Denver Market Research Is Cost Effective

The cost of market research is less in Denver, too. We’ve found that recruiting costs are about 25% less than in other parts of the country, especially Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and New York City.

People Love It Here

Not only do our clients enjoy coming to the new FDR Innovation Center for market research projects (and spending some quality time in the Rocky Mountains the weekend after), but, for the last two decades, there has been a flux of businesses moving to the Denver area, which has created a diverse population from all over the country.

In fact, according to the US Census, Colorado is the second fasted growing state. Between July 2014 and July 2015, 100,000 people moved here. 

Colorado is a nice place to be!

Check back soon. We’ll talk more about market research in Colorado as well as Colorado demographics here on the FDR blog.