Standaryzacja informacji marketingowo-technicznych na etykietach olejów silnikowych w świetle badań ankietowych

On a global scale, there are various types of guidelines trying to unify engine oils and their designation elements. Such solutions contribute to an increase in the market share of technologically advanced engine oils and allow for a reliable comparison of products by end users. The purpose of conducted own research was to obtain opinions of the lubricants industry employees and end users on the rationale of introducing this type of regulation also in Poland. An auditorium survey and an Internet survey were used as research methods. Respondents were asked for their opinion on the legitimacy of the postulate of engine oil standardization, the legitimacy of setting minimum quality levels for engine oils intended for trading in Poland, the legitimacy of defining the term „synthetic oil” and other related terms. In the area of research concerning labelling, opinions were obtained on the postulates of obligatory placing on the labels of engine oils: information on oil quality according to API/ACEA/OEM, standardization in terms of letter size for description of quality categories, standardization in terms of description of quality categories having obsolete status, information on intended use, marking of production batch, information about the place of production, production date, expiry date, type of base oil used. The respondents also expressed their opinion on the postulate of standardization of marketing and technical information communicated to buyers of the service – engine oil change. On the basis of the analysis of 87 completed questionnaires, it was found that both employees of the Polish lubricants industry and users perceive the postulate of standardization of engine oils as reasonable. Over 80% of the respondents expressed support for most of the areas of standardisation proposed in the questionnaire. The area where oil standardization is desirable to the least extent is the standarization of letter size for the description of oil quality on its label and standardization for the description informing the user about the obsolete status of the product quality category. In the light of the obtained research results, recommendations were proposed for entities placing engine oils on the market with respect to the scope of marketing and technical information that should be communicated to users.