Managing Director

Alison is Managing Director of Counterpoint, and took a circuitous route to market research. She studied Sociology and Social Policy at Strathclyde University, then Sociology and Education at Leicester University where she gained a PhD. She then spent 3 years lecturing at Strathclyde University and working as Research Officer for the Partnership in Education Project. This project supported initiatives aimed at young families in a peripheral housing estate in Glasgow and involved conducting research amongst young children, their parents and the professionals with whom they dealt.

Alison then moved to London and into commercial market research. Since then, Alison has developed a reputation for handling complex, strategic research studies, evolving and developing new techniques and methodologies. She set up Counterpoint Research in 1991. Since then the company has worked with some of the largest global corporations  such as Sony, Motorola, Intel, Nortel and NCR; key government agencies and departments  including HDA/NICE, COI, Department of Health, Department for Children, Schools & Families, DTI, MoD, DSS and NHS; most of the main media players in the UK BBC (a wide range of departments), Channel 4, Channel 5, Paradigm Media, ITC, BSC, Ofcom and the Advertising Standards Authority; and through them, a wide variety of advertising agencies.

Alison has presented papers at a variety of conferences including the MRS and the Manchester Broadcasting Symposium, and has published a number of papers and articles, the latest being the BSC's Research Working Paper on Images of Disability in the Media. Alison regularly lectures on MRS qualitative research courses and has had a variety of articles printed in Marketing, Marketing Week, and Campaign. Her personal interests include music and travelling.