Business Research: Which Business Database Should I Use?

If you need:

Try using:

A Good Place to Start

S&P Global Net Advantage, Gale Business Insights  and Mergent Online provide a variety of company information in an easy to use format. 

Annual Report

For annual report (10K) required by SEC, use Edgar, S&P Global Net Advantage or Mergent Online. For glossy annual report for shareholders, see the company’s website

Background Information

Encyclopedias and Ebooks: Britannica Academic, Encyclopedia of Business Information Sources, Making Sense of Business Reference, Guide to Reference in Business and Economics, The Basic Business Library, 

Business Plan Information

How To Write A Business Plan: A Step By Step Guide, How to Write A Business Plan

Case Studies

Business Source Complete or ABI/Inform Collection and limit results to "case study" under document type and add search terms

Chief Officers

Company's 10K, Mergent Online, S&P Global Net Advantage, Gale Business Insights

Company Profiles

Mergent Online, S&P Global Net Advantage, Gale Business Insights Business Source Complete

Competitor information

Mergent Online, Gale Business Insights At the company profile page

Country Reports

Mergent Online Under tab "Country Insight", Nexis Uni

Customer Demographics/ Consumer Market Segmentation

Mergent Online, Mergent Intellect, Census.gov Also check  Industry Reports for segmentation information. 
 

Employee Information

Gale Business Insights, You can also check the company's annual report
 

Financials

Mergent Online, Gale Business Insights S&P Global NetAdvantage 

Harvard Business Review

Business Source Complete and search under "Publications"

Harvard Business Cases

Order through InterLibrary Loan

History (company)

Gale Business Insights Business Source Complete (Market Line Reports), Mergent Online

Industry reports

S&P Global NetAdvantage, Mergent Online, Gale Business Insights , Business Source Complete

Investment reports

Investext (Included in Mergent, Tab on Top of Main page) S&P Global NetAdvantage, Gale Business Insights

Lawsuits and legal actions

Long Term Plans

10K, company website

Market Share information

Gale Business Insights 

Market reports

Investext (Included in Mergent, Tab on Top of Main Page) Business Source Complete

Marketing information

Advances In Global Marketing: A Research Anthology : also search the library catalog for books on Marketing

News and articles from trade journals

ABI/Inform Collection, Business Source Complete, Wall Street Journal, Nexis Uni

Operations information

Gale Business Insights, Mergent Online, company web site

Parent/subsidiary companies

Gale Business Insights, Mergent Online, Business Source Complete, company web site

Regulatory information

Business.gov, the SEC, OSHA, the FDA and other government websites

Scholarly research

Academic, Scholarly or Peer-reviewed journals; electronic from databases ABI/Inform Collection, Business Source Complete, Academic Search Complete, Gale Business Insights 

SEC filings (10K, 8K, Def14A, etc.)

The SEC’s search site Edgar, S&P Global Net Advantage, Mergent Online, the company’s web site

SEC Violations

SEC Litigation, Nexis Uni 

SIC or NAICS Code

Naics.com, Business Source Complete 

Statistics

Census.gov, U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis 

Stock prices

S&P Global Net Advantage, Yahoo Finance, Bloomberg, or company web site

SWOT analyses (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats)

Business Source Complete (Marketline Report or Advanced Search), Gale Business Insights  (Link is on Company Profile page)

Wall Street Journal fulltext online

The Wall Street Journal via ProQuest