From transnational to multi-local or what french fries and sewing machines have in common...

First, my most sincere apologies to the readers of the blog.. I do tend to make a lot of typos in my posts. Even though I try my best to correct them, some still manage to crawl in..

As a consolation prize to those undeterred by my lousy typing skills, here is yet another fascinating article on the subject of global brands. Even though the book (pp. 304-306) lists numerous challenges that companies and, more specifically, marketers face when going global -- standardization vs. localization, packaging, translations, etc. -- the reward can be truly golden. Randall Frost in Local Success on a Global Scale gives examples of companies so successful in many different markets that their products were perceived as local! (Hence, the term "multi-local"). Singer was one of them: founded in America, it expanded into Europe, where it was thought to be Spanish during the Spanish-American war, Russian in the Russian Empire, and even avoid being bombed by German aviation during the WWII because of its perceived teutonic origin).

McDonald's is another example. Quoting "Pulp Fiction":


Vincent: And you know what they call a... a... a Quarter Pounder with Cheese in Paris?
Jules: They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with cheese?
Vincent: No man, they got the metric system. They wouldn't know what the fuck a Quarter Pounder is.
Jules: Then what do they call it?
Vincent: They call it a Royale with cheese.
Jules: A Royale with cheese. What do they call a Big Mac?
Vincent: Well, a Big Mac's a Big Mac, but they call it le Big-Mac.


A Big Mac is a Big Mac, but "Le Big Mac" is undoubtedly gallic. Frost argues that "although the restaurant chain has made numerous efforts to localize its menu (it offers, for example, salads in the US, lamb burgers in India, vegetarian burgers in the Netherlands, teriyaki burgers in Japan, salmon sandwiches in Norway, frankfurters in Germany, and poached egg burgers in Uruguay), it did not gain local acceptance worldwide by marketing local specialties." The company's real success was its fries (or, Big Mac) that resonate with local tastes in many countries.

An important conclusion, drawn from the influential work "The Globalization of Markets" by Theodore Levitt of Harvard is that "to be successful, modern global companies would have to focus on products that address universal consumer needs or preferences."

The Brand Channel site offers a wealth of resources on brands and products.