2. Hoover´s Handbook

Description of Publication: Hoover´s Handbook

The Hoover’s Handbooks cited above provide profiles on specific companies, both domestic and international, in terms of size, growth, visibility, and so on. The good news is the detailed profiles of 1,500 companies (all large); the bad news is that there are approximately 20 million of them (almost all small), not including farms. The top 500 companies represent about 55 percent of the U.S. gross national product.

One primary reason the Hoover’s Handbooks are offered at the beginning of this book is the service that its publisher, Hoover’s Inc., provides. Hoover’s, Inc. is a leading provider of business information to the mass market. Its Hoover’s Company Database, for example, is the only "reasonably priced source" (according to its editors) for information on the operations, strategies, histories, financial performance, and products of major U.S. and global public and private companies.

The format is simple, well organized, and easy to read. A list of the databases produced by Hoover’s includes:

Hoover’s has a point about low price. The set of four Hoover’s Handbooks sells for $294.95. But Hoover’s strength is also its weakness. It has excellent thumbnail sketches of domestic and international companies; however, these sketches are very basic, which could be exactly what’s needed or analytically not sophisticated enough to be appropriate.

Nevertheless, Hoover’s has a lot of reference products in print, on-line, CD-ROM, and diskette formats. Hoover’s Company Profiles, for example, is ideal for executives, investors, career changers, salespeople, consumers, and scholars—anyone who needs to know about companies. Do yourself a favor and get the catalog (call [800] 486-8666). The company makes its database available on Hoover’s Online (http://www.hoovers.com)and through America Online, Bloomberg, CompuServe, Dow Jones News Retrieval, LEXIS-NEXIS, and other services.

Hoover’s Handbook of American Business is, according to James F. Ryan, president of Zacks & Perrier, "exactly the kind of business reference book I’ve been looking for most of my life." It’s a useful book for the developing analyst as one can see from the table of contents.

Using the Profiles" addresses the question, "What companies will our readers be most interested in?" In answering that question, four general criteria were used: size, growth, visibility, and breadth of coverage. The 750 profiles are presented in alphabetical order. The overview section covers such important questions as: where, who, what, when, rankings, and key competitors.

A particularly interesting section of the handbook is "A List-Lover’s Compendium," which has such lists as: "30 Years of Change in the Fortune 500," "20 Most Advertised Brands," "Largest Beer Companies in the U.S."

The largest and probably most important section of the book is dedicated to The Company Profiles, an example of which can be seen in the sample pages from Hoover’s Handbook of American Business and Hoover’s Handbook of World Business.

Finally, the book finishes with three Indexes: "Index of Profiles by Industry"; "Index of Profiles by Headquarters Location"; and "Index of Brands, Companies, and People Named in the Profiles."

Hoover’s Handbook of World Business is very similar in format to Hoover’s Handbook of American Business. Some aspects of the book that are almost identical to the previous volume include: A List-Lovers Compendium, The Company Profiles, and three indexes. This volume has some excellent, but very basic information.

Hoover's also publishes an excellent book called "Cybertools for Business'' by Wayne Harvis (ISBN 1-57311-025-6) that focuses on descriptions of websites useful for business research. The table of contents covers such interesting topics as:

www.hoovers.com
info@hoovers.com

Hoover´s Handbook

annual business publications
For more information, call: Hoover’s, Inc.,
Phone (800) 486-8666
Fax (512) 374-4501

In this section:

2. Hoover's Handbooks
3. Standard & Poor's
4. Robert Morris Associates' Annual Statement Studies
5. FASB Accounting Standards
6. The Wall Street Journal
7. Occupational Outlook Handbook
8. Harvard Business Review
9. Who's Who in America
10. MIT's Technology Review
11. Small Business Sourcebook
12. Peterson's Guide to Four-Year Colleges
13. American Heritage
14. The Worldly Philosophers

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