THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, November 12, 1994 TAG: 9411120152
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAVE MAYFIELD, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 56 lines
Issues and Answers Network Inc., a national telephone-research and polling company based in Virginia Beach, has opened a satellite office in Oklahoma City and is considering adding a third facility in Iowa.
The expansion comes as Issues and Answers is quickly developing an overseas market for its telephone-interviewing services, increasing its need for employees and office space.
``We felt compelled to go outside the area,'' said Peter J. McGuinness, the company's president, ``because we tapped out the market here, at least when it came to part-timers.'' Even after raising its starting pay by 75 cents, to $5.50 an hour, Issues and Answers hasn't been able to recruit enough local interviewers, he said.
Issues and Answers was started in 1988 in Norfolk and moved to its headquarters on Bonney Road in October 1993. It is making calls from its U.S. facilities to as far away as Hong Kong, McGuinness said.
The company has 390 employees at the Beach location, all but 30 of them part-timers. The operation is highly computerized. Interviewers read questions from computer screens and then enter responses by typing or clicking on their keyboards.
Last year, McGuinness said that he planned to build the local work force to about 500 by this time. But the improving local labor market has made recruiting tougher, he said.
McGuinness said that part of the problem is there are more local employers competing for back-office workers. QVC Network Inc., Bernard C. Harris Publishing Co. and Lillian Vernon Corp. are among those rapidly expanding their local work forces.
At the Oklahoma City facility, which opened last month, about 90 employees are on board. McGuinness said employment there will increase to about 150 in the next several months.
He said that if Issues and Answers lands a few large contracts it is competing for, it will likely add another facility in Iowa. He said the company is scouting for sites there.
Issues and Answers will pull in about $5 million in revenues in 1994, McGuinness said, up more than 10 percent from last year. About 5 percent of its business is overseas - in Mexico, Europe, South Korea and Hong Kong. ``I can see that growing to probably 15 percent within a year and a half.''
McGuinness said that Old Dominion University's Foreign Languages and Literatures department has helped his company hire local students and others with foreign-language skills.
Most of the overseas calls are part of business surveys for telecommunications clients. In the U.S., Issues and Answers is also heavily involved in surveys of physicians and other health care providers on behalf of pharmaceutical companies. It does political polling as well. by CNB