Indian Readership Survey: An Introduction

All of your have heard about it; most of you have read about it; a few know about it. And for the remaining who wishes to know more about it, here is a brief introduction to the Indian Readership Survey (IRS).

IRS is essentially a readership measurement study. The prime objective of the study is to collect readership information from a cross-section of individuals, in great detail, so as to present a true and unbiased picture of their readership habits. On the media front, it also captures information on television and cinema viewership, radio listnership and internet usage. In addition to this, IRS also captures information on various FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) products’ usage and consumption and durable ownership amongst households and individuals. Since media and product ownership / consumption information is captured from the same household, it enables linkages between the media and product data.

Fieldwork

IRS fieldwork, which lasts for a year, is continuous in nature. It is broken up into two rounds with a balanced sample. In a typical year, the first round’s field work starts from July to December followed by the second round in January to June. Data is reported on a moving annual total i.e., the average of two consecutive rounds.

Scope – All India

IRS 2005 (Round 1 + 2) has a sample size of 235,428 covering 1,318 towns and 3,084 villages.

The entire sample is spread equally between the two rounds. Individual reporting is done for 70+ cities that includes all one million population towns (35) and a few other cities of strategic importance to our users.

Key Findings

North has the highest concentration of SEC A households (13.3%). South is the lowest(7.7%).

Not surprisingly, North has the highest number of illiterate housewives (59.6%), and South has the least (40%).

West has the highest concentration of working housewives (48.5%) and North the least (21.6%). Maybe this explains why most North Indian housewives are obese!

For those who are still ignorant about the way India lives here are some penetration figures. No, not the number of times Indians have sex damn it! These are penetration figures among households, rather!
TV: 40 +%
Pressure cooker: 31 - 40%
Refrigerator: 11 – 20%
Motorbike and CD player: 6 – 10%
Automobile and Personal computers: 1 – 2%
A/C, Vacuum cleaner, Microwave, Digital Camera: < 1%

The top 10 channels both in terms of reach as well as viewers base are South-based. In fact only 25% of the top 20 vernacular channels are non-South.

The MNC’s are trying hard to lure the Indian consumer, but it is still the age-old Indian brand of refrigerator – Godrej that has acquired its space in maximum number of households in the country, be it urban or rural across the zones.

Source: Hansa Research and MRUC booklet. www.hansaresearch.com / www.mruc.net