Market research report example: a worked, annotated sample

The brief behind the example

Every report starts from a brief, so this one does too. The retailer sells kitchenware, textiles and small decorative items online in the Netherlands and Belgium. Its board wants to know whether Bulgaria justifies a localised shop or whether the budget should stay in existing markets. In our terms, it is a small market entry study.

Annotation: a real report would carry this table on page two as well. Anyone who joins the project late learns the question, method and timing in thirty seconds.

Executive summary: the answer on page one

Sample text: "We recommend launching in Bulgaria in 2027 as a test market with a narrow range and a local returns partner, not as a full-range shop. Online buying has grown quickly from a low base: according to Eurostat, 51.2% of people aged 16–74 bought something online in 2025, up from 30.9% in 2020, although this is still the lowest share among the 27 member states. Consumer prices are far below Dutch levels, so the Dutch price list cannot simply be copied. Interviewees would try an unfamiliar foreign shop if delivery is quick, returns are free and customer service answers in Bulgarian. The main risk is weak consumer confidence, which deteriorated through 2026."

Annotation: the first sentence is the recommendation, complete with its condition. Each later sentence carries one finding, and each number has its source and year. Nothing appears here that the body does not prove. The rules behind this paragraph are set out in our guide to writing the executive summary.

Chapters 1–2: objectives, scope and method

Sample text: "Scope: online sales of homeware to private consumers in Bulgaria. Out of scope: furniture, business buyers and selling through marketplaces. Sources: Eurostat data on internet purchases, price levels and consumer confidence; World Bank population data; 16 online interviews of 45–60 minutes with people who had bought homeware online in the past year, recruited with a screener across Sofia, Plovdiv, Varna and smaller towns; a structured review of 10 Bulgarian and international web shops. Limitations: the interviews show reasons and expectations, not shares of the population."

Annotation: limitations come before the findings, not in a footnote. Because the fieldwork is qualitative, the report never turns interview counts into percentages. Our page on in-depth interviews explains why sixteen conversations can map the range of views without measuring how common each one is.

Chapter 3: market context, with the sample chart

Sample text: "Bulgaria is the smallest but fastest-growing online market in our comparison. The share of residents aged 16–74 who bought online rose by 20.3 percentage points between 2020 and 2025."

Sample text, continued: "For comparison, Eurostat puts the 2025 share at 73.6% for the EU and 94.2% for the Netherlands. The World Bank counts 6,433,302 inhabitants in Bulgaria in 2025, a little over a third of the Dutch population of 18,087,633."

Annotation: the chart caption says what is measured, the note gives the dataset code and period, and the sentence above it interprets the trend. One tempting shortcut is avoided on purpose: multiplying the total population by 51.2%. That share applies only to people aged 16–74, so the product would overstate the shopper base. The report takes the 16–74 population from Eurostat's demographic tables instead, the same discipline we apply in market sizing. You can test assumptions like these in our TAM/SAM/SOM calculator.

Chapter 4: customers and prices

Sample text: "Price levels for household consumption in Bulgaria are less than half the Dutch level, but the gap narrows for goods. Homeware has no separate category in the comparison, so we use clothing and footwear as the nearest proxy for semi-durable goods."

Source: Eurostat, prc_ppp_ind, 2024.

Sample text, continued: "In the interviews, three expectations came up repeatedly: delivery within a few days, free and simple returns, and the option to pay on delivery. Several interviewees said they would look for reviews in Bulgarian before ordering from a foreign shop."

Annotation: the proxy is labelled as a proxy, so nobody mistakes it for a homeware price index. The interview findings use words such as "repeatedly" and "several" rather than figures, which is the honest way to report qualitative fieldwork. If the board later needs shares, a survey supplies them.

Chapter 5: competing shops

Sample text: "We compared ten web shops selling homeware to Bulgarian consumers on six criteria: range depth, delivery options, return terms, payment methods, language of customer service and price positioning. The comparison table marks, for each criterion, whether the retailer would be stronger, similar or weaker."

Annotation: one comparison table beats ten separate profiles, because the board sees at a glance where the retailer could win. Profiles of individual shops move to the appendix. A full competitor analysis would add positioning maps and digital footprint; for a go/no-go screen, the table is enough.

Chapter 6: risks and what would change the answer

Sample text: "Consumer confidence is the main external risk. Eurostat's indicator for Bulgaria stood at −29.1 in October 2026, against −23.8 a year earlier and −17.3 for the EU as a whole. A test launch limits exposure if household spending stays cautious. We would revisit the recommendation if confidence fell towards its lowest reading since 2019, −36.6 in April 2020, or if the returns rate in the test made local delivery unprofitable."

Annotation: a useful risk chapter names the indicators to watch and the thresholds that would change the advice. That turns a one-off document into something the board can monitor month by month.

Chapter 7 and appendices: recommendations and evidence

Sample text:

1. Launch a Bulgarian-language test shop in 2027 with a narrow range of best-selling items.
2. Sign a local delivery and returns partner before launch.
3. Set prices from a Bulgarian price study rather than from the Dutch list.
4. After six months, survey 400 online shoppers; at that size the margin of error is about ±4.9 points at 95% confidence.
5. Review the decision after twelve months against agreed targets for orders, returns and repeat purchases.

The appendices hold the interview guide and screener, the full competitor table, a source list with dataset codes and extraction dates, and a short glossary.

Annotation: every recommendation traces back to a finding and can be checked later. The survey size is justified with arithmetic; you can rerun it in our sample size calculator. Appendices exist so a sceptical reader can check the work while the main text stays short. For the generic chapter template and length guidance, see our article on market research report format.