I first went to China about 10 years ago, I remember coming back from Shanghai and saying to my wife “forget LA, New York - these cities are unbelievable” … well the world has witnessed the rise of China’s economy since then and the public at large have had their minds and eyes opened to China through events like the Beijing Olympics and the F1 coming to Shanghai.
I recently found myself reading the synopsis to Wally Olin’s ‘The Brand Handbook’, where he predicts the expanded range of products from around the world in our local shops and describes the phases in which the faster developing world economies, like China, start to develop international brands, leading eventually to brands developed for their home markets but with international potential.
I think he’s right, certainly about the aspirational consumerism in BRIC economies, but the question is what is the relevance of BRIC homegrown brands to Western markets? Surely the reasons these brands are emerging is that these home markets with their new middle classes and rising standards of living offer more long term potential than our debt ridden and over regulated economies. So will the end result for us be a wider set of choices or just a different one?
Tags: brands, BRIC, Marketing, Wally Olins