We are very sad to hear of the death of Gerald Goodhardt, the distinguished marketing scientist and statistician whose research contributions were mainly in the area of consumer purchasing behaviour in relation to markets and media.
During the course of his career he wrote many papers in statistical and marketing journals. His main research interest was in modelling consumer purchasing behaviour and he published widely in marketing journals, often co-authored with such people as Andrew Ehrenberg, Byron Sharp, Malcolm Wright, and Patrick Barwise. Two highlights were the papers read to the Royal Statistical Society and published in the Society's Series A journal, in 1966 and in 1984 (the Dirichlet model).
He was appointed the Sir John E Cohen Professor of Consumer Studies at the City University Business School in 1981 and after retirement in 1995 he became an Emeritus professor at City University, a visiting research professor at the University of South Australia, a visiting research associate at London South Bank University and a visiting professor at Kingston University.
At the RSS, Gerald was a member of the Research Section committee from 1970-73, a member of the General Application Section from 1974-76 and its chairman from 1976-77, a member of the journals committee from 1978-79, and a member of the social statistics section committee from 1980-81. He was elected to Council for the period 1978-81, and went on to become Honorary Secretary of the Society from 1982-88.
He was awarded the Market Research Society Gold Medal in 1967 and also a New Gold Medal in 1996 for an ‘exceptional contribution to market research over very many years’.
Gerald was also founding President of the Market Research Benevolent Association and was heavily involved with setting up the Ehrenberg-Bass Marketing Science Centre (later to become the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science).
Gerald was described by colleague Chris Chatfield as ‘a very likeable man, who was a pleasure to work with. His keen brain and ability to ask the right questions made joint research a constructive, positive experience.’