I had an opportunity, the other day, to accompany a business person who was considering doing some business overseas, and he was repeating that he’d take advantage of “Japanese Quality” which he was confident of to compete with others, and I was a bit skeptical about it.
High quality would be better than low, of course, but if the costs and prices are high as well, it’d be difficult to be accepted. Also, there’s another question if that much high quality is always required.
One of the reasons why the person would put emphasis on the Japanese quality is because of the large market share of Japanese cars and motorcycles overseas. However, when it comes to home electric appliances, we often find Korean-made ones. When I talked to an engineer of Panasonic, he mentioned that “the quality of our products is really competitive”. However, a high level of quality doesn’t equal high sales results. There should be some reasons that some particular products attract people besides a high quality.
There is another example. I have often been suggested that when I come to buy an iPhone, I should buy it at a certain shop because there are shops that sell fake iPhones, which is a commonly known fact among Cambodian people. On the other hand, people use copy products of Louis Vuitton, Gucci, or such brands, which means that people do not always tend to buy genuine articles.
In this way, there are products that have been widely accepted and ones that weren’t accepted, regardless of their qualities, and there should be reasons why. It might be because of their sales strategies, or could be just timings. Anyways, it might be dangerous to simply think that products of Japanese quality will be bought overseas if brought from Japan.
Since I don’t have any experience of selling products myself, I don’t mean to exaggerate my thoughts or have a clear answer to it, but I could say that the high level of quality doesn’t necessarily direct to sales not only in Cambodia but also in any other countries.
I told these facts to the person mentioning that it’s just my point of view, but I don’t mean to stop him from advancing overseas, and I’d rather want him to do it and succeed in it. Therefore, I talk mainly about demerits and difficulties whenever I talk to people who think of advancing overseas. Also, my opinions are just ones of a lot of opinions of various kinds of people, so I always suggest those people who consider doing business overseas to listen to as many people as possible for opinions, then lay out plans. And when they actually start up some business upon deliberation, I’d do as much support as I can.
I’d like more people to advance in Cambodia for businesses and succeed in it. Therefore, I’d like people who’ve been living in Cambodia for a long time with a lot of knowledge to tell newcomers not only good aspects of advancing in Cambodia but also difficulties.
By the way, I mentioned how it would be to play soccer with women in the last month’s issue, and I recently had an opportunity to actually play soccer with a woman. As a result, she wasn’t in the least inferior to other male players physically, and I was rather tossed about by her.
I came to know afterward that she used to play soccer in a non-professional soccer league in England, and I had to admit that I was wrong to think that women can’t play sports mixed with men at full forth.