Marketing in Hong Kong

Day 11

I've been sick for the past couple of days. I have a sore throat, runny nose, body aches, and headaches. However, NO FEVER which is the discriminating symptom between cold and flu. If I have someone ask me if I have swine flu one more time I'm gonna.... hmm... no idea. I'm just tired of people saying I have swine flu. Fortunately I have an angel for a room mate and she's been taking good care of me. She forces me to take this Chinese honey syrup, she got me vitamin C and zinc tablets, and has cooked noodles for me. She is amazing. I hate being sick, it ruined my entire weekend. I've done nothing but lock myself in my room and sleep for countless hours. Ebe and I took a walk around the shore front of our University and I still can't believe I actually go here.

Anyway, my room mate, Ebe, is also a marketing major. We like to talk about different Marketing techniques especially pertaining to Hong Kong. When exploring MongKok, Ebe told me about clustering in Hong Kong. The same stores will all be in one area. For example, there was a whole street of shoe stores. Then underneath the travel agency, there was a whole street of photo shops. Clusterting is a community effort and each cluster of businesses look out for one another. They don't compete with one another to ensure maximum profits. Clustering is beneficial for small businesses in HK because it cuts advertising costs. If you are needing a certain product or service, you know which district to go to immediately. Since all the stores charge about the same price, it's effecient in that there is minimum wait and it is the same quality product or service.

Shoe district on MongKok

They say Hong Kong is a mixture of western and eastern ideas. People in Hong Kong pride themselves in being "internationalized" therefore, products that are Japanese or Western are extremely successful here. In beauty care, Japanese concepts and products and highly desired. Ebe showed me her Maybelline make up remover and how it has Japanese writing in the back. Even though the product is made in China and Maybelline is an American brand, having Japanese characters gives the Chinese a sense that it's better quality. It's not suprising to me that country of origin means so much here. My parents have immense brand loyalty to Japanese brands such as Sony and Toyota.