Industry research is somewhat less linear than corporate research. A few sources provide general guidance, but these serve as a starting point, providing a map to other sources available much as this guide does. Two excellent guides of this type for industry research are The Encyclopedia of Business Information Sources and Business Information Sources (see under "Guides to Business Reference Sources"). These works list specific sources for all types of information on individual industries.
For a relatively brief overview of an industry, the best sources to use are Standard & Poor's Industry Surveys and U.S. Industry & Trade Outlook (see under industry "Overview Sources") and Value Line (see under "Company/Industry Information Sources"). Some industries have yearbooks or other specialized works that are excellent sources of information. These sources and others can be identified by using the library's Online Catalog or the above-mentioned guides to business sources.
Industry statistics can be found through both commercial and government sources. Many industry statistics and other types of information are arranged by Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes soon to be replaced by the North American Industrial Classification System (NAICS). The SIC system was devised by the federal government to describe and classify all goods, products, and services manufactured or provided in the U.S. Arranged first into 5 broad industry classifications, the code is further divided into 4 levels of subdivisions, thereby assigning 4-digit codes to specific products or services. Refer to the Standard Industrial Classification Manual (see under industry "Overview Sources") for complete descriptions of the classifications. Certain sources, primarily those published commercially, will create SICs that subdivide categories even further, often to 7 or 8 digits.
For information about industries, government documents are highly recommended sources. There are several indexes to these materials, including the American Statistics Index and the Statistical Reference Index (see under industry "Indexes to Statistics") for statistics collected at the federal and state level respectively and U.S. Government Periodicals Index (see under "Business Periodical Indexes and Abstracts") for government articles.
As with company research, articles frequently are among the best sources of information on industries. The most appropriate periodical indexes to use for industry research are F & S Index, Business and Industry, General Business File, and ABI/Inform (see under "Business Periodical Indexes and Abstracts"). For industry information for a specific locale, newspaper indexes are especially useful. Books on industries should also be consulted; use the Online Catalog to identify and locate them. You should check the Library of Congress Subject Headings manuals (near the Reference area library workstations) to determine the proper subject headings or terminology used to classify materials by subject in the catalog. For additional strategies on searching the Online Catalog, consult a reference librarian.
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