trade & industry associations - National Retail Federation, etc.

Just a reminder that trade and industry associations are often a great place for industry statistics and other valuable information. (Some of the information may be for members only; some may be available at no cost.) There are thousands of associations out there on almost every imaginable industry, market, or area of interest. One standard resource for locating these associations is the Encylopedia of Associations -- the most current print edition that we have in the USFSP library reference collection is from 2004 (HS17 .G332). We also have a subscription to the current electronic version -- select "Databases by title/subject," and type in Gale's Ready Reference Shelf. Or, you can also quickly identify trade and industry associations by doing an advanced search in Google.

As an example of a trade association that may be useful to your research, take a look at the National Retail Federation web site: http://www.nrf.com. Select the "industry information" tab and note the types of research conducted by NRF and the resources available. Many of the reports are available for purchase. However, some information is available at no cost. For example, under Research/Retail Industry Research, some of the free reports available include: 2007 Global Powers of Retailing; 2006 Online Retail Holiday Best Practices Report; Retail Horizons; and Retail Industry Indicators. Press releases for many of the other pay-reports are also available.