Word: marts
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...risk. Start-ups like LynkUs are looking for established partners willing to share their customers. Big firms like WebMD are trying to legitimately absorb new ideas from start-ups. Manufacturers like Ford are sharing research with partsmakers like Lear and consulting them on product designs. Stores like Wal-Mart are giving their suppliers minute-by-minute sales data and in return asking all about the suppliers' inventory, capacity and customer lists...
...That's not to say the foreigners are unstoppable. Both Wal-Mart and Carrefour, the world's second largest retailer, tried and failed to crack the Hong Kong market in the 1990s. Hong Kong consumers seemed to prefer familiar neighborhood chain stores. Carrefour lost $400 million between 1996 and 2000 on four Hong Kong outlets. "It all ended in tears, really," says Alan Treadgold, director of retail research for ad agency Leo Burnett Worldwide in Sydney. "They just couldn't make the format work...
...Undeterred, foreign hypermarkets have learned to adapt, often by forming joint ventures with domestic partners and by stocking local wares. "A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that when Wal-Mart comes to town, we set up exactly the same system as we do everywhere," says Holley of Wal-Mart. "But we take our best practices and customize it to each market." On Wal-Mart's shelves in China, for example, consumers can find indigenous delicacies such as whole roasted pigs and live frogs?hardly staples at corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas...
...Costco is not yet turning a profit on its Japanese operation, but still plans to build up to 70 stores there. Wal-Mart is edging into this market too, having recently taken a stake in ailing, 400-store food-and-clothing chain Seiyu. In fact, hypermarkets have aggressive expansion plans throughout Asia. Superstores face slowing growth in saturated home markets. They need to expand their territory to maintain growth rates. Wal-Mart intends to boost its international sales?now less than 20% of its total revenue?to a third of total revenue within five years. That means building new stores...
...foreign businesses to appease the World Trade Organization, tussles over details like licensing have blocked Carrefour's bid to win approval for stores in Beijing. In February, Guangdong province in southern China introduced tax cuts and other incentives to aid domestic retailers. Seven Chinese chains?including one called Wu-Mart?have drafted a plan to jointly open 1,500 hypermarkets and other stores over the next five years to compete with the expansionary interlopers. "Compared with the foreigners, Wu-Mart is more aware of the Chinese people and their consumption customs," says Wu Jianzhong, Wu-Mart's vice president...