ABSTRACT
A distinctive feature of service activities is their heterogeneity; a characteristic which has undoubtedly dogged attempts at systematic analysis. Perhaps one should, therefore, begin by trying to define a ‘service’? It is probably most easily expressed as the exchange of a commodity, which may either be marketable or provided by public agencies, and which often does not have a tangible form. Services seem to ‘pass out of existence in the same instant as they come into it’ (Greenfield, 1966, 7), or the term ‘service’ itself ‘implies the existence of two parties, those rendering the service and those to which the service is rendered’ (OECD, 1978a, 8). In other words, the industries which provide material and tangible commodities are agriculture or manufacturing or construction, while a bar, say, which stocks beer and lager under conditions designed to ensure that they are served at the right temperature to the paying customer or prepares ‘bar snacks’ at lunchtime is providing a service. Equally the preparation of an advertising portfolio for the lager manufacturer wishing to promote a new brand is a service but-and this is a constant source of confusion when trying to identify services-the firm that assembles the brewing vats and related equipment required to produce the new lager is classed as a secondary industry. Note that such a firm does not create the finished product which it assembles, that task may be performed by an engineering company.
