ST. LOUIS (OBBeC) - Sigma-Aldrich has announced that BioInformatics, LLC, a market research company for the life science industry, has reported that the Company's online product catalogue (http://www.sigma-aldrich.com/catalog) is considered by scientists to be "most useful" and "easiest to use".

"The results of this survey validate Sigma's strategy of continuous user involvement in the development of their online catalogue," said Bill Kelly, president of BioInformatics, LLC. "By understanding how scientists rely on their catalogue throughout the research process Sigma has successfully transferred their expertise in traditional catalogue marketing to the Web and taken advantage of all that the electronic medium has to offer."

The frequency with which customers use the company's catalogue also correlates to what is perceived as the "best" in the market today. It was discovered that the three most important features of online product catalogues are "prices listed adjacent to product descriptions," "protocols" and "product descriptions." Since 96% of scientists access online catalogues at least once a month, having the "most useful" and "most frequently used" is a great success for Sigma-Aldrich. Scientists spend, on average, 2.6 hours a week viewing online catalogues.

The Sigma-Aldrich print catalogue (http://www.sigma-aldrich.com/sigmacatalog) placed #1 in "most useful" and "easiest to use." The BioInformatics report states that approximately "80% of scientists use print catalogues at least once a month." The items that are found most important by scientists in print catalogues are "prices listed adjacent to product description," "product descriptions" and "application information." Almost half of all scientists spend 1 to 1.5 hours a week using print catalogues.