ACNielsen Homescan MegaPanel Expansion Now Complete; CPG Industry's Leading Consumer Panel Generating Wealth of New Consumer and Shopper Insights.

SCHAUMBURG, Ill. -- Numerous New Services Already Launched, More Planned

ACNielsen U.S. today announced the completion of its ambitious Homescan(R) consumer panel expansion, a two-year initiative that has more than doubled the size of the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry's leading source of consumer and shopper insights.

The expanded panel, now at an unrivaled 125,000 households, is delivering vastly more comprehensive and detailed information about American consumers than ever before. As a result of the MegaPanel expansion, existing Homescan services have been significantly enhanced, numerous new, innovative client solutions have been launched, and more are planned for in 2006 - all designed to provide marketers (both manufacturers and retailers) with unprecedented new insights into consumer and shopper behavior.

Procter & Gamble Associate Director of Global Market Measurements, Chuck Cramer, said, "This panel provides us a more robust sample to enhance our analysis and understanding of consumer purchase dynamics. It has also given us an improved ability to understand non-covered channels."

The panel expansion, along with major investments in Homescan's data collection processes and output infrastructure, has enabled ACNielsen to introduce a host of new solutions to address the most important issues facing today's CPG manufacturers and retailers, including:

--  Category Management and Retail Shopper Insights

        --  Channel Views provides more detailed insights into
            fast-growing retail channels including dollar, warehouse
            club, home improvement, pet stores and other specialty
            retailers.

        --  Shopper Missions, based on an analysis of over seven
            million shopping trips, identifies the "need states" that
            drive consumer shopping occasions.

        --  Store Brand Insights provides a complete understanding of
            the private label buyer while assessing how effectively
            retailers are driving shopper penetration, spending and
            loyalty with their store brands.

        --  Shopper Trends helps manufacturers collaborate with
            retailers to understand the impact of shopper attitudes on
            retailer equity and manage the opportunities and risks
            associated with high and low equity shoppers.

        --  The introduction of Retailer Trade Areas provides Homescan
            analysis of retailers' performance within the custom
            geographies where they compete.

        --  The addition of 29 new markets brings to 52 the number of
            markets where market-specific Homescan analysis is
            available.

    --  New Product Development

        --  Enhanced new product performance tracking, driven by the
            largest longitudinal purchase panel in the industry,
            enables marketers to evaluate the success of their new
            product introductions at a much earlier stage in their
            introduction to determine initial trial and subsequent
            repeat purchasing.

        --  New Product Alert provides manufacturers of new products
            with direct feedback from new product triers and repeat
            purchasers immediately after a product is purchased. The
            online service quickly surveys new product buyers about
            their motivations for purchase, satisfaction, intention to
            repurchase and the impact of advertising and promotional
            activity on their decision to purchase the new product.

    --  Expanded Marketing ROI Measurement

        --  Media Facts links consumers' shopping and buying behavior
            with their media habits, helping marketers determine where
            to best reach their buyers.

        --  Project Apollo, a joint VNU/Arbitron single-source panel,
            assesses the impact of advertising across a wide array of
            media platforms.

        --  Yahoo! Consumer Direct Powered by Homescan, enables CPG
            companies to reach category and brand buyers on the Yahoo!
            network and then measure the impact of their online
            targeted marketing campaigns on retail sales.

    --  Ethnic Marketing

        --  A total U.S. Hispanic service will enable marketers to
            position their products and services to better address the
            unique preferences of acculturated Hispanic consumers

        --  African American Consumer Facts will provide a syndicated
            national view of African American shopping and purchasing
            behavior.

    Lastly, several specialty panels will be available in early 2006,
including:

    --  A Beauty/Personal Care Service, which will provide the
        industry's most comprehensive measurement of beauty/personal
        care categories and enable marketers to identify consumer
        segments based on where consumers shop and what they buy.

    --  Homescan Consumer Segments, a suite of services which will
        deliver insights into the unique attitudes, shopping and
        purchasing behavior of important consumer segments including
        households with babies, young children, teens, baby boomers
        and seniors.

ACNielsen Global Panel Services President, Robert Tomei, said, "There's never been a greater need to understand the nuances of consumer behavior, with marketers trying to serve ever more narrowly defined consumer segments while at the same time trying to identify the factors that drive behavior among these various segments of population. We are extremely pleased to be able to address those needs with our expanded Homescan consumer panel."

ACNielsen, a VNU business, is the world's leading marketing information provider. Offering services in more than 100 countries, the unit provides measurement and analysis of marketplace dynamics and consumer attitudes and behavior. Clients rely on ACNielsen's market research, proprietary products, analytical tools and professional service to understand competitive performance, to uncover new opportunities and to raise the profitability of their marketing and sales campaigns.

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