...resource-based view provides a framework for management strategy development. So could it explain why different firms adopted different strategies even in the same environmental context. Question To analyze the strategies of Carrefour and how these strategies interact with Chinese government policies and local market conditions? CARREFOUR The Carrefour Company was created by the Fournier and Defforey families in 1959 in France, with the meaning of its name— “crossroads” expressing convenience. Today, Carrefour has reached 30 countries in Europe, Latin American and Asia. Currently, Carrefour has opened over 12,500 stores all over the world, with sales in 2006 of $114.9 billion and 456,000 employees. Store Formats. Carrefour operates three store formats in China: Carrefour hypermarkets, Champion supermarkets, and Dia discounted convenience stores. Since Carrefour entered China in 1995, hypermarkets were the principal format for Carrefour expansion. Carrefour opened 150 Dia discounted convenience stores in Shanghai and 100 in Beijing in 2003 (www.carrefour.com.cn), but faces fierce competition from 7-Eleven stores from Taiwan. Carrefour would more likely to learn from and follow 7-Eleven in the convenience store niche . Store Location. China is still a country with a relative low income level and hence the mainstream power of consumption remains in large and prosperous cities and city centers. Therefore, Carrefour establishes their stores in first tier cities...
Words: 948 - Pages: 4
...Carrefour vs Walmart Kelly Liu stared out from her office window at the traffic on Shanghai’s Yannan “gao jia” as she wondered what to do. Kelly was the head of business development for Walmart China and had a key meeting at the end of the week with her Board of Directors. After 8 years in China, Walmart was still well behind Carrefour in terms of number of stores, brand awareness and revenue. The Board had called a special meeting and asked Kelly to present Walmart’s new growth strategy. She pondered what plan to suggest. Overview In 2006, France-based Carrefour Group (Carrefour), the second largest retailer in the world, successfully completed eleven years of its operations in China. As of September 2006, Carrefour operated in China through its 80 hypermarkets. China was Carrefour's sixth largest market, with sales of over US$2.06 billion in 2005. Carrefour Comes to China As one of the first foreign companies to enter the Chinese retail industry, Carrefour played a major role in bringing about a retail revolution in the country. It leveraged its experience in the international markets and introduced a few of its global best practices into the Chinese market. Until the 1980s, the retail industry in China was fully controlled by the Government. The department stores run by the Government provided little in the way of conveniences. According to Wang Zhirong, General Manager of Tian Bai department store in Dalian, concepts like customer service and choice were...
Words: 777 - Pages: 4
...Compare and contrast the strategies of Carrefour and Walmart in the Chinese market Although the whole world has been affected by global recession, China’s economy still grows in a rapid rate compared with other countries’. Furthermore, the expansion of China’s retail market has attracted world’s largest retailers, Walmart and Carrefour, to pile in. The expansion strategies of the two global retailers seem to play a crucial role in the competition in China. Thus both similarities and differences of strategies are worth considering and will be respectively analyzed in the essay. One of the most significant similarities of Walmart and Carrefour’s strategies is that both of them learn about the diversity of regions and customers. Ed Chan, the Walmart China’s CEO, pointed out that not only income level, but also customer preferences were affected by the regional diversity (McKinsey Quarterly, 2009). It suggests that from coastal area to inland regions, the economy is less developed and the income level is accordingly lower. As a result, customer preferences vary from the eastern to the western part of China (McKinsey Quarterly, 2009). Similarly, Carrefour treats coastal and inland customers respectively to adapt to region differences in China. For instance, live fish is displayed to customers in fresh area but frozen fish is sold to people in vast regions according to the diversity of their preferences (Child, 2006). Another similarity is that in addition to coastal cities...
Words: 1122 - Pages: 5
...Master of Business Administration Strategic Management Carrefour Misadventure in Russia Supervised By John Kalmus Submitted By STU 22782 Submitted To IBAM Word Count 3898 Submission Date 22 January 2011 Carrefour strategy is comprised of following components • Organic, Sustainable and Profitable growth • Fast return on capital employed • Market Leadership through • Acquisition Carrefour started business in 1963 by introducing the idea of hyper market by providing thousands of products under one roof. Soon after the success of hyper market Carrefour started targeting the customers with discounted stores. Carrefour is now world Europe largest and world second largest. Carrefour Major Merger and Acquisitions • 1998 acquisition of Comptoirs Modernes • 2000 merger with Promodes • 2000 partnership with Maus group to enter to Switzerland • 2001 acquisition of Notre largest retailer in Belgium • 2003 acquisition of Italian retailer Hyparlo which increased its stake in Colombia from 55 to 100 • 2003 joint venture with Norwegian company Norges Gruppen • 2003 acquisition of Ahold in Poland • 2004 sold 1.2 billion $ assets for growth • 2005 acquisition in Taiwan, Turkey, Cyprus and France • 2005 sold $264.1 million assets to Tesco in Czech Republic and Slovakia • 2006 acquisition of 5th largest retailer in Spain • 2006 selling of South Korea operations to E-Land • 2007 acquisition in Romania • 2010 100% acquisition of Turkish company ...
Words: 4424 - Pages: 18
...A Comparative Study of Asia Strategy: Wal-Mart versus Carrefour Miao-Que Lin Fu Jen Catholic University, China. Wen-Kuei Liang Tatung University, China. Abstract Wal-Mart, the number one retailer in the world, persistently maintain three fundamental beliefs—respect everyone, total-solution service, and in search of highest quality—to shape their unique corporate culture. They insist lowest price every day, carry out total solution services, effectively control the cost of global logistics, fully leverage information technology to become e-company, powerfully motivate employees to work and share knowledge and adopt a play-safe strategy in internationalization. As for the number two player—Carrefour, they provide customers with one-stop shopping, lowest price, fresh products, self-served shopping in a hypermarket with free parking lots. In contrast to Wal-Mart’s internationalization strategy, Carrefour expands to foreign markets faster and more flexible than their counterpart. This study investigates the configuration in Asia, marketing service, product procurement, logistics management, digitalization and human resource management of Wal-Mart and Carrefour. The authors then propose strategic implications for global retailers to increase their management effectiveness and efficiency. Introduction Wal-Mart founded by Sam Walton adopted circumventing strategy by starting her operations in small towns and then expanding to bigger cities. She maintains lowest price everyday...
Words: 3853 - Pages: 16
...Solutions to Organizational Challenges Introduction “With China expected to grow three times faster than the U.S. this year, it is no wonder that American companies are looking to China as they try to boost their profits” (Epstein & Meredith, 2010). Companies are reacting quickly to get a cut of the action in China. It is viable for companies to create an efficient strategy that will effectively distinguish themselves from its competitors and have the capability to conquer the foreign market. However, when entering to unfamiliar territories there are many challenges that companies ought to overcome such as cultures, regulation, communication barriers, and so forth. Currently, Wal-mart and Carrefour are dominating in China as the foreign discount stores but they have different strategy to compete in China. Background In 1959, Carrefour was created in Southern France and became international by 1969. “It innovated with the hypermarket format in France in 1963 where it introduced the idea of one stop shopping for food, clothing, electronics, appliances, etc. Although it does not compete in the USA, it has adapted successfully to Latin American and Asia markets” (Arnold, 2002, p. 563). “Now, it serves over 2 billion clients per year in its more than 9,000 stores, which are present in 32 countries across 3 geographic zones. Carrefour is not only the second but also the most internationalized retailer worldwide” (Shiue, Der-Juinn, & Yeh, 2006, p. 171). ...
Words: 1571 - Pages: 7
...Localization Strategies of Transnational Retailers in China A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF ARTS By Wang Yue (王玥) Supervised by Prof. Yang Zuxian (杨祖宪) Southern Yangtze University, Wuxi, Jiangsu, China June, 2006 Contents Acknowledgements----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------i Abstract & Key Words-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------ii 1. Introduction---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 1.1The Problem and the Study Objective----------------------------------------------------------1 1.2 Current Study-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 2. Localization----------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------3 2.1 The Definition of Localization ----------------------------------------------------------------3 2.2 The Importance of Localization Strategy to Transnational Retailing---------------------3 2.3 Three Layers of Localization for Transnational Retailing----------------------------------4 3. Retail Transnational in China------------------------------------------------------------------------7 3.1 The Status Quo of Chinese Retail Environment --------------------------------------------7 ...
Words: 8446 - Pages: 34
...Carrefour- A Comparison Of The Behaviour Of Carrefour In- And Outside China In Terms Of Csr Carrefour- a Comparison of the behaviour of Carrefour in and outside China in terms of CSR - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Table of contents - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Executive summary I. Chapter – Introduction 1. Purpose of the Study 2. Objective of the study 3. The setup of the study II. Chapter – Carrefour’s position in China 2.1 Chinas retail market at a glance 2.2 Carrefour’s role in China III. Chapter – The purpose of CSR for multinational companies 3.1 The definition of CSR 3.2 The growing importance of CSR in China 3.3 The importance of Human Rights 3.4 Human Rights in China 3.5 Carrefour’s general employment practice standards 3.6 Carrefour Europe vs. Carrefour China 3.7 Conclusion VI. Chapter – Environmental concerns and CSR 4.1 Environment 4.2 Environmental Problems in China 4.3 Carrefour Europe vs. Carrefour China V. Chapter – Food Safety problematic and CSR 5.1 Food Safety 5.2 International Food Standards and Initiatives 5.3 Food Safety in China 5.4 Carrefour Europe vs. Carrefour China Literature Internet - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Executive summary China is one of the countries where globalisation has...
Words: 296 - Pages: 2
...| MNGT220 Case Study on Carrefour in China | | | Wong Angus Kwan Ho 33239096Matthew Lok 33239355Lei hou in 33149836 Pan Yue 33517622Ma Jing 332396812/7/2014 | | Word count: 1098 (excluding reference and title) Brief Introduction The world’s second largest distributor had good results in Asia and Latin- America, earning an average turnover growth of over 6% and reaching total sale volumes of 16.14 billion euro and 7.22 billion euro respectively. However, Carrefour on its home market France sales had a recent decline of 1%. The Carrefour group has over 13,000 stores in Europe with four categories: hypermarket, supermarket, convenience store or hard discount store. The report aims to explore the competitive environment for Carrefour in the Chinese market. 1. Briefly describe the competitive environment of the home market for Tesco/Carrefour/Walmart. Porter’s Five Forces Rivalry among existing competitors The French retail market is highly competitive, there are some large retailers are accounted for big market share. The top retailers are Leclerc, Carrefour and Intermarché with 17%, 12.5% and 11.7% market share respectively. They are competing at the level of the sales force, of the advertising, the image and adopted strategy. Bargaining power of suppliers The diverse product range distributed by retailer, there is a large number of substitute inputs. Thus, high competition exists among suppliers...
Words: 1483 - Pages: 6
...Carrefour- a Comparison of the behaviour of Carrefour in and outside China in terms of CSR - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Table of contents - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Executive summary I. Chapter – Introduction 1. Purpose of the Study 2. Objective of the study 3. The setup of the study II. Chapter – Carrefour’s position in China 2.1 Chinas retail market at a glance 2.2 Carrefour’s role in China III. Chapter – The purpose of CSR for multinational companies 3.1 The definition of CSR 3.2 The growing importance of CSR in China 3.3 The importance of Human Rights 3.4 Human Rights in China 3.5 Carrefour’s general employment practice standards 3.6 Carrefour Europe vs. Carrefour China 3.7 Conclusion VI. Chapter – Environmental concerns and CSR 4.1 Environment 4.2 Environmental Problems in China 4.3 Carrefour Europe vs. Carrefour China V. Chapter – Food Safety problematic and CSR 5.1 Food Safety 5.2 International Food Standards and Initiatives 5.3 Food Safety in China 5.4 Carrefour Europe vs. Carrefour China Literature Internet - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Executive summary China is one of the countries where globalisation has led to a significant change of the economical as well as the social frameworks. Multinational corporations are expending in...
Words: 8802 - Pages: 36
...INTRODUCTION This is an analysis and strategies report that a French group of retail sector called Carrefour needs to use to expand his business in China before other foreign competitors expand in China. Carrefour is a French group of the retail sector founded in 1959 by Defforey Fournier. Currently, Carrefour is the second largest group in this sector in terms of revenue behind Wal-Mart and it is number 1 in Europe, South America (Chester, 2012) Carrefour is also present in Asia with around 371 hypermarkets and with 64 hypermarkets in other areas of the world in the form of local partnership and its aim is “to become the preferred retailer that is supportive throughout the world” in all of its formats (Carrefour Foundation Annual Report, 2010) China is an Asian country, with two states currently claim to have sovereignty: the People's Republic of China, which controls 99.6% of its territory and the Republic of China, which only controls Taiwan. It’s only in 2008, that the two governments united, have agreed for a more cooperative atmosphere (BBC Monitoring, 2014) Currently, China is the most populated country in the world with around a population of 1.33 billion. China has 20 cities with more than 5 million of people and 100 cities with over 1 million people. In the period of 2011 and 2015 China’s annual average GDP growth is predicted to be 9.5%. China is the largest growing GDP per capita in the world (Rodgers, 2012) China is a country with the world’s largest exports...
Words: 1475 - Pages: 6
........... 8 2.2 Elements of the Supply Chain......................................................................... 9 2.3 Three levels of Supply Chain Management.....................................................11 2.4 Supply Chain Management Technology…….................................................. 13 III. The supply chain solution for Multinational giant Retailers in China................. 13 3.1 Wal-Mart’s development in China............................................................. 14 3.1.1 When Wal-Mart first came into China............................................. 14 3.1.2 Challenges Wal-Mart met in China.................................................. 17 3.1.3 Wal-Mart’s supply chain solution in China....................................... 17 3.3 Carrefour’s development in China ............................................................. 17 3.2.1 Introduction of Carrefour ............................................................ 19 3.2.2 Learn from Taiwan’s experience entering into China....................... 19 3.2.3 Supply chain...
Words: 5290 - Pages: 22
...Case Study: Wal-Mart in China (2012) In 1996, China’s national economy was growing at a rapid pace. The gross domestic product reached over US$1064.4 billion, an increase of 9.7% over the previous year. To further increase and attract foreign investment, the Chinese government increased its number of experimental, special economic-zoned cities in which foreigners could operate a business. There were, however, restrictions set forward by the government, in that all foreign businesses would have to be in a joint venture or other type of cooperative agreement with at least one Chinese partner, with that Chinese partner getting a stake greater than 51%. In August 1995, Wal-Mart, the great American retain chain and Middle America success story, arrived in China, establishing a joint venture with Shenzhen International Fiduciary Investment Co, Ltc, China. In 1996, Wal-Mart opened its first supercentre and a Sam’s Club in the special economic zone of Shenzhen. In 2007, Wal-Mart acquired a 35% stake in Trust-Mart, a Taiwanese-owned chain of retail supercentres operating in the Middle Kingdom. By 2010, Wal-Mart’s presence in China grew to 189 units in 101 Chinese cities, with the creation of over 50,000 local jobs. By 2012, the company nearly doubled its presence with 370 stores in 140 cities. As the U.S. and European economies slumped in late 2011 and into 2012, the world’s number-two economy became an even more important growth market. In the first quarter of 2012, China’s...
Words: 1895 - Pages: 8
...success if its performance is satisfactory, as the image of the product cannot be maintained if product performance is inconsistent. Similarly public relations cannot be more effective than the corporate behavior behind it. Public relations involves more than corporate communications. China had experienced bad publicity ahead of the Olympics where Beijing's image was seriously battered by widely publicized protests especially in London, Paris and San Francisco, disrupting the Beijing Olympic torch relay. Also, Chinese embassies and consulates in several cities were also damaged because of protests by pro-Tibet groups and others capitalizing on the publicity of summer Games. Therefore, China decided that it would be a better idea to hire foreign Public Relation firms to handle the publicity issues of the games. “Several British and US agencies were invited to interviews with Chinese officials to discuss a contract, which includes pre-games PR strategies, media training and market research on western perceptions of China. Beijing intended to take full advantage of the opportunity to showcase the progress china has made in the three decades since economic reforms were launched. ). Finally China decided to hire US Weber Shandwick and British Bell Pottinger as the major PR firms of the 2008 Beijing games. Beijing...
Words: 585 - Pages: 3
...Wal-Mart in China Executive Summary Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is the largest retail company in the United States and is larger than any other retail chain in the world. Wal-Mart is more than just the world's largest retailer. It all started with a simple philosophy from founder Sam Walton: Offer shoppers lower prices than they get anywhere else. That basic philosophy has shaped Wal-Mart's culture and driven the company's growth in the United States. This culture is most prevalent at the company's headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas. Wal-Mart has had phenomenal success in the US due to a few key factors. First, a model based on cost control was centered around offering the lowest prices in the market, with an emphasis on beating any competitors’ price by an average of around 20%. Second, it targeted a niche by focusing on the customers that everyone else seemed to neglect, the small town shoppers. Wal-Mart started by concentrating on opening stores in small towns and introduced innovative concepts such as self-service. Their strong customer demand in small towns led to the rapid growth of Wal-Mart. The main reason for Wal-Mart's success in smaller towns was that it offered low prices and catered to the specific needs of the targeted consumer. The strategy was especially successful as it achieved instant market saturation leading to very strong loyalty. This strategy also helped Wal-Mart stay below the leading competitor’s radar while building up their competitive...
Words: 4869 - Pages: 20
