Center for Marketing and Consumer Insights

Close to the customer research for businesses and new industries

Our Mission

A spotlight on your customers

At the Center for Marketing and Consumer Insights (CMCI), we believe customers are at the heart of business — and understanding customers is the most important function in marketing. CMCI conducts marketing and consumer research for businesses that want to know more about their customers.

For more than 20 years, our researchers have served globally renowned brands such as Harley-Davidson, Honda, Tillamook and Gerber Foods. We have served nonprofits and community-based organizations such as Oregon Symphony, Benton County Hospice and Portland Mercado. We also have conducted research for government entities, such as the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The roots of CMCI can be traced back to the Close to the Customer Project (C2C) founded by Drs. Hal Koenig and Jim McAlexander in the early 2000s. CMCI carries on that standard of excellence: creating novel research projects at the intersection of research methodology expertise by College of Business faculty, tireless curiosity of graduate and undergraduate business students, and businesses that appreciate deep insights into its customers.

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Let's Collaborate

Gain professional insights

We hear this question a lot: How can Oregon State faculty expertise benefit and grow my business? Our answer is: By allowing us – teams of top-tier College of Business marketing professors and students – to perform consumer insights research and to support marketing strategies that lead to business advantage.

With services that include brand testing, consumer behavior, market barriers and industry analysis, each project partners expert faculty and inquisitive students to conduct research on your behalf.

Services & Solutions

Client Highlights & Past Projects

Our reputation for excellence

CMCI has worked with clients across industries – technology, financial services, consumer and industrial products, food and beverage, media, and education, to name a few.

Our portfolio includes our good friends and colleagues at the OSU Foundation and OSU colleges of engineering and forestry, leading Oregon businesses such as Reser's Fine Foods, HP and Tillamook Cheese, and global corporations such as Kia USA, Intel and adidas Group.

Whatever the scope and scale of your project, you can trust our commitment to excellence and quality, start to finish.

See Our Clients

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Student Opportunities

Experience CMCI

Research with CMCI is a signature experience for both undergraduates and graduate-level students. We recruit from students seeking marketing degrees, and we also actively welcome all OSU students to bring their insights and voices to CMCI projects across a range of industries.

With guidance from expert, world-class faculty, students work on client projects, develop marketable skills and build a network with fellow students, professors and industry professionals.

Student Opportunities

Our People

Meet the CMCI Experts

College of Business marketing faculty bring their research expertise to the Center for Marketing and Consumer Insights. Collectively with decades of experience within industry and academia, contributing to top-tier publications and editorial boards and guiding student excellence, they find solutions that are ahead of the curve. CMCI's reputation for excellence has a global reach.

Interdisciplinary research brings together expertise from across the college and the OSU campus paired with industry and client input to deliver results for every project.

Meet Our Experts

CMCI brochure