市场学case5Consumerbehavior.doc

Company case 5 (Consumer behavior) Shiseido: Intent on being number one Like most corporate president, Yoshiharu Fukuhara of Shiseido, Japan’s largest cosmetics manufacturer, wants his company to be number one. Unlike most corporate presidents, he does not define number one as being first in sales or profits, but rather as being number one in quality. Fukuhara says, “We’re talking about being number one in quality, number one in corporate image, and number one in service. That’s our goal.” To reach its goal of being the world’s largest manufacturer of cosmetics, Shiseido will have to increase sales outside Japan from 9 percent to 25 percent. To do this, the company has its eye on the U.S. where current market share is a tiny 1.3 percent or $59.5 million in sales. Understanding the U.S. market and increasing market share will be the task of Hisako Nagashima. What is Ms. Nagashima’s first tactic in storming the U.S. market? Change the name. “[Although] Shiseido is a treasured name for us with 125 years of history behind it,” she notes, “[the name] is unpronounceable for Americans and hard to remember.” Ms. Nagashima has put her finger on a serious problem for corporations operating in the global arena – the poor translation of a company’s heritage from one culture to another. In Japan, Shiseifowas the first firm to introduce Western-style toothpaste in 1888 and first to open a soda fountain in 1902. the company developed its competitive advantage in the 1920s when it worked out a unique arrangement with retailers in which they agreed to sell only Shiseido’s cosmetics on the conditions that Shiseido would repurchase any unsold cosmetics. Through this arrangement, Shiseido became both manufacturer and wholesaler. It developed a network of 25,000 Japanese retailers – about half of all of Japan’s cosmetics and pharmaceutical shops – that sold its products exclusively. As a result, Shiseido controlled distribution and developed a pricey image. Thus, Shiseido has a long his