Obituary: Australian Research Pioneer David Bottomley

Dr David Theodore Bottomley AM, who has died aged 97, started one of the first market research consultancies in Australia, and convened the first meeting of what later became the country's national research association (now The Research Society).

Dr Bottomley was born on Christmas Day in 1924 in Somerset, UK, and died at his retirement home in Doncaster, Victoria, on August 23rd this year. At the age of one he was, in his own words 'exported to Australia' with his parents and three older brothers, his father having a three-year contract as minister to the Melbourne Unitarian Church.

David attended Wesley College in Melbourne from 1933 to 1941, then the University of Melbourne, graduating with a B.Sc. in Chemistry, Physics and Mathematics and then a Dip Ed: he became a science teacher at Albury Grammar School, where he completed his B.Ed., but decided to leave the profession and in 1953 established Australian Sales and Service Bureau, later to become Australian Sales Research Bureau (ASRB) with Irving Saulwick, David Jones and Nan Lansell. In 1955, he convened a meeting in Melbourne to form the Victorian Market Research Society, which soon became national and has since been known as the Market Research Society of Australia (MRSA), the Australian Market and Social Research Society (AMSRS), and most recently The Research Society (TRS).

Dr Bottomley left ASRB and Australia in 1986 for Hong Kong, forming Asia Market Research Directions, which was the pollster for the South China Morning Post, among many other clients. He returned to Australia in 2011.

Among his many writings were a pioneering 1959 book, Introduction to Market Research, and an invited commentary for TRS in 2012, Joseph Banks (1743-1820): The market researcher whose client was the British Empire - the latter published in the Australasian Journal of Market & Social Research and available through the TRS web site.

In 2016 Bottomley was appointed a Member (AM) in the General Division of the Order of Australia, in the Queen's Birthday awards, For significant service to business, particularly to the social and market research profession, and as a mentor to young researchers, and in 2019 at the age of 94 he became Australia's oldest recorded Ph.D. graduate on completion of this thesis for Curtin University.

Responsible for 'the training, development and mentoring of countless numbers of individuals who have entered our profession' (TRS) he was awarded the Fellowship of what was then the MRSA in 1978. Married to his wife Anne for 71 years, he is survived by four children, thirteen grandchildren and thus far one great grandchild.

This article is an abridgement of a fuller obit on www.researchnewslive.com.au by authors and TRS Fellows Alastair Campbell and Dr David Bednall - many thanks!

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.