Are we reaching the 'peak' of panel members

Pete Comley, Chairman of Virtual Surveys, has a great post about a concept he has termed 'Peak Panel'. 'Peak Oil' was a concept developed Marion King Hubbert in 1956, where he predicted that the total known reserves of oil would take a bell shaped distribution, with the peak of US-based reserves occuring in the 1970s.

Pete has applied this approach to the number of people on online access panels. Pete takes the view that, at most, some 5-10% of the population might be induced to join a panel. However, we have already seen that panels suffer significant losses in terms of active respondents. Indeed, Pete conjectures that in the US we may have already passed the point of Peak Panel, i.e. the point at which the largest number of people are on a panel.

Needless to say, if we treat panel members badly the height of the peak panel figure will be lower, and the downturn mroe severe.