单选题
Passage Two
After Tesco entered the Thai market in 1998 with its brand of colorful, well-stocked superstores, angry local competitors tried to impede the powerhouse UK-based retailer's progress with a wall of lawsuits—including one that would have forced Tesco Lotus, the company's regional subsidiary, to shut off air-conditioning because chilly stores posed a public health hazard to the equatorial Thai people. Frivolous legal actions were a minor nuisance compared with what came next. Over a five-month period last year, two Tesco Lotus outlets were bombed, another peppered with automatic weapons fire and yet another hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.
Despite threats by governments to ban them, chains including France's Carrefour and US-based Wal-Mart are ramping up plans to hundreds of new outlets throughout the region over the next several years. The onslaught threatens to run local retailers right out of business. Local retailers are not the only ones displaced when the superstore comes to town. Because of their high turnover, hypermarkets can throw their weight around with local suppliers by demanding lower prices. Costco buys directly from manufacturers to stock its two stores in Japan—a practice that disrupts the country's entrenched but inefficient distribution networks. That's not to say the foreigners are unstoppable. 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.
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."
Mike Sinegal, head of Costco's Japan operations, agrees that stores must trim their sails according to prevailing winds, but dismisses the notion that Asian consumers are very different from shoppers in, say, Los Angeles. When Costco entered Japan, he says, local suppliers insisted American shampoos wouldn't sell because Japanese hair is different. But Costco's private-label brand quickly became one of its top-selling products. "The bottom line is that the uniqueness of these markets is overrated," says Sinegal.
Local retailers assert that they are more aware of the local people and their consumption customs compared with the foreigners. Shoppers, however, don't seem to care. Because of economic globalization, it doesn't matter whether you are a foreign store or a domestic store. What's important is that you provide what local customers really need at a price that most people can afford.