ABSTRACT
Stratford Equipment was a fairly small company, a relatively autonomous subsidiary of a large, diversified group. It produced fairly cheap industrial products used by industry. It had only one competitor of any importance in the UK and few in the world. Sales in both home and export markets had been increasing rapidly. Precise information about the size and rate of growth of Stratford Equipment's industry was difficult to obtain. However, since there were only the two British producers of any consequence, and since Stratford believed that its home sales were at least as large as those of its rival; it was confident that it produced at least half the UK output. Market information was not collected on a regular and systematic basis. It was felt that there was little need for this, since both home and export sales had been increasing rapidly for many years, and there was no reason to expect much slackening in them.
