Public vs. Private
Public companies (companies authorized to sell stock to the general public) are legally required to file financial statements with the SEC and share information with their shareholders. Private companies do not publish much information about themselves as a key competitive strategy.
Public vs. Private Companies: How Do They Differ? (Yahoo! Small Business Advisor)
What's the difference between publicly- and privately-held companies? (Investopedia.com)
Tips for Searching Databases
Use keywords.
Combine keywords with boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT).
If your research involves a company, search by the ticker symbol of that company, if available.
If you are doing industry research, search by industry code when possible.
Not sure where to start? Here are some databases organized by research need...
- ABI/INFORM Global This link opens in a new windowProvides indexing and abstracting for 1000 periodicals with full text for more than 600 publications.
- Regional Business News This link opens in a new windowThis database provides comprehensive full text for regional business publications (including titles from Crain Communications). This database has full text for more than 60 sources.
Business-specific databases that provide articles and some non-journal content.
- ABI/INFORM Global This link opens in a new windowProvides indexing and abstracting for 1000 periodicals with full text for more than 600 publications.
- EconLit This link opens in a new windowEconLit is a reliable source of citations and abstracts to economic research in over 400 books, journals, dissertations, and working papers.
- Statista This link opens in a new windowStatista.com, by Statista, Inc. provides data on over 60,000 topics from over 18,000 sources, categorized into 21 market sectors. Statista.com provides quantitative data on media, business, finance, politics, and a wide variety of other areas.
- Historical Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new windowThis database provides full-text and full-image articles from the Wall Street Journal. The collection includes digital reproductions of every page from every issue--cover to cover--in downloadable PDF files from 1889-2010.
- Morningstar This link opens in a new windowFind a stock or fund to meet your needs, research current or prospective holdings or see how your investments work together. Morningstar's data reports cover more than 20,000 securities.
- Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new windowIndexes, abstracts, and provides online full text for the Wall Street Journal newspaper 1984-present
- Value Line Investment Survey This link opens in a new windowThe Value Line Investment Survey is one of the most widely used independent investment information services in the world. Its up-to-date, weekly issues are a comprehensive reference source. Its coverage is encyclopedic, covering some 1,700 equity issues.
For each stock in its universe, the Value Line Investment Survey offers year-ahead and three- to five-year probable relative price performance, projections of key financial measures, and concise, objective commentary on current operations and future prospects.
The Value Line Investment Survey's main section, "Ratings & Reports," presents full-page, individual stock reports and industry reviews. The "Summary & Index" provides a key to locating the latest quarterly and supplementary reports and cites the most recent data on each of the stocks followed. Finally, "Selection & Opinion," a feature section, gives Value Line's views on the economy and the stock market and on stocks of special interest.
- ABI/INFORM Global This link opens in a new windowProvides indexing and abstracting for 1000 periodicals with full text for more than 600 publications.
- Academic Search Ultimate This link opens in a new window
Academic Search Ultimate offers access to an unprecedented collection of resources including journals, magazines, reports, books, and videos. Many are peer-reviewed and full-text. Subjects range from astronomy to zoology.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowJSTOR provides access to more than 12 million journal articles, books, images, and primary sources in 75 disciplines. Includes complete runs of journals with full-text of all articles published prior to the most current five years; eBooks; ArtStor images; and primary sources. Coverage spans the humanities, sciences, and social sciences.
- ScienceDirect This link opens in a new windowScienceDirect's Freedom Collection includes extensive full-text journal coverage of the physical and biological sciences, as well as some coverage of the social sciences and humanities. For a LIMITED TIME, Elsevier is making all of their textbooks available at no charge, as well as 20,000 free articles.
- Web of Science This link opens in a new windowThe Web of Science Core Collection provides seamless access to the Arts & Humanities Citation Index, the Emerging Sources Citation Index, Science Citation Index Expanded, and the Social Sciences Citation Index. It enables users to search current and retrospective multidisciplinary information from thousands of the most prestigious, high impact research journals in the world. Web of Science also provides cited reference searching. With it, users can navigate forward, backward, and through the literature, searching all disciplines and time spans to uncover all the information relevant to their research. Users can also navigate to electronic full-text journal articles. Hosted content includes MEDLINE (back to 1950) and these regional collections: SciELO Citation Index, KCI-Korean Journal Database, and the Russian Science Citation Index.
- Statista This link opens in a new windowStatista.com, by Statista, Inc. provides data on over 60,000 topics from over 18,000 sources, categorized into 21 market sectors. Statista.com provides quantitative data on media, business, finance, politics, and a wide variety of other areas.
- Historical Statistics of the United States This link opens in a new windowComplete text of the 5 volume Millennial edition, 2006. Provides data in electronic format useful for statistical analysis.
- Baltimore Sun This link opens in a new windowIndexes, abstracts, and provides online full text for The Sun, Baltimore (Baltimore Sun) newspaper 1990-present.
- Historical Baltimore Sun This link opens in a new windowIncludes complete issues of The Baltimore Sun,cover to cover from 1837 to 1996. Search by keyword, more than 20 article types, date ranges, specific dates, author, and more. View news articles, photos, advertisements, classified ads, obituaries, cartoons, and more for added context. Print and download articles and images in PDF format.
- Historical New York Times This link opens in a new windowThis database provides full-text and full-image articles from the New York Times. The collection includes digital reproductions of every page from every issue--cover to cover--in downloadable PDF files from 1851-2018.
- Historical Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new windowThis database provides full-text and full-image articles from the Wall Street Journal. The collection includes digital reproductions of every page from every issue--cover to cover--in downloadable PDF files from 1889-2010.
- New York Times This link opens in a new windowIndexes, abstracts, and provides online full text for the New York Times newspaper (1980-present), the New York Times Book Review (1988-present), and the New York Times Magazine (1997-present).
- Regional Business News This link opens in a new windowThis database provides comprehensive full text for regional business publications (including titles from Crain Communications). This database has full text for more than 60 sources.
- Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new windowIndexes, abstracts, and provides online full text for the Wall Street Journal newspaper 1984-present
- Washington Post This link opens in a new windowIndexes, abstracts, and provides online full text for the Washington Post newspaper 1987-present
- Checkpoint Edge This link opens in a new windowCheckpoint Edge is the industry leader providing intelligent information to tax and accounting professionals—including expert research, guidance, technology, tools, learning, and news. Checkpoint is relied on by thousands of professionals to understand complex information, make informed decisions and use knowledge more efficiently. Access is limited to 35 simultaneous users.
Analyzing Competition in a Local Market
Many small businesses are either family owned or owned by one or a few partners. They are usually private companies who do not sell stock. Only the companies that are traded on the stock market make information about their organizations available to the public. Private businesses do not share financial, personnel, or sales data information.
There are other ways to analyze your competition and get the information you need--or at least come up with viable estimates.
How to find your competitors in a local market
Search yellow pages and directories
- Whitepages (.com)Click on Business near the search fields to search the Yellow Pages by category of business in a city/state.
- Superpages (.com)Search by category and cite/state for businesses in the Yellow Pages.
- ThomasNetSearch for suppliers, whitepapers, and more. Limited content before requiring a free account.
Search the local Chamber of Commerce and/or Economic Development websites for business directories. These resources also contain an abundance of information and data on the local industries.
- Maryland State Data CenterThe Maryland State Data Center (SDC) is an official partner with the U.S. Census Bureau.
- Maryland Department of CommerceClick on Business Resources at the top of the page to locate an abundance of information on key industries in Maryland, business development, data, and more.
- Salisbury, MD Area Chamber of CommerceFor information relating to commerce in Salisbury and Wicomico County, MD. For a list of companies, browse the Member Directory under Membership.
Search Census information as a map, report, or data tables.
- Census Business Builder - Small Business EditionMap companies in a particular region operating in a particular industry or sector. You can create map layers for additional variables (consumer spending, population, etc.) as well as generate a report on that industry.
+eBooks
There are over 100,000 Ebooks in Library's collection. Ebooks can be used 24/7 from any computer with an internet connection.
+Search Company Webpages
Companies sometimes provide a lot of information via their virtual storefront or webpage including financial statements, product information, company history, and news releases. Aspects of the corporate culture may also be ascertained by website design, and the way the company and its products are advertised.
Along with the company name, add search terms such as "investor relations" or "annual report."