Eth 316 - Cross Cultural Perspectives

Cross-Cultural Perspectives

XXXXXXX

ETH 316

February 22, 2016

Professor Lisa Sparaco, PhD

Cross-Cultural Perspectives

Introduction

        Starbucks is a company that is well known around the world.  They are a massive organization with a multinational presence that has led the world in coffee sales for many years.  However, when Starbucks decided to move their coffee sales into the Chinese markets, they came across a huge cultural issue that could have easily slowed down their expansion if not halted their growth within China.  Starbucks needed to figure out a new perspective on how their business would operate within China, otherwise their expansion would fail.  Within this paper, we will discuss these ethical perspectives within Starbucks, compare these perspectives across cultures involved with Starbucks, and describe a viable solution for this issue that could be acceptable by all stakeholders.

Ethical Perspectives

        Starbucks has always been known as a world leader in premium coffee sales.  They have built a huge business on making what they see as the best cup of coffee and have ensured that each customer’s cup of coffee is exactly how they wanted it.  Otherwise, they would remake the cup of coffee for them.  The issue when it came to China was that the Chinese population was not exactly favorable on the idea of coffee.  The Chinese however, for thousands of years, have enjoyed a nice cup of tea.  Therefore, tea has become the norm for China as coffee is for other countries around the world.  The ethical issues that came from this was would Starbucks stick to their business model and try and push the idea of a coffee drink onto the Chinese, or would they change their business plan and sell great cups of tea rather than coffee in China.

Compared Perspectives

        Before breaking into the Chinese market, Starbucks had to do five things correctly.  (1) Think Differently.  Traditionally, Chinese are tea drinkers.  Starbucks had to do a market study to determine what segment of the population to focus their coffee sales.  (2) Position Smart.  Instead of using advertising, Starbucks focused on highly visible and high traffic locations to project its brand.  (3) Brand Global.  Starbucks sent baristas from other parts of the world to train Chinese baristas.  These baristas acted as ambassadors for Starbucks and they helped to ensure Chinese stores met the Starbucks standards.  (4) Partner Local.  By collaborating locally, Starbucks were able to overcome cultural differences within the country.  Inland China has different values from coastal China.  (5) Commit Long Term.  Starbucks had to pledge to a long-term commitment.  An important strategy is to recruit and train employees and this takes time to accomplish.  Good employees can make or break a business (Wang, 2012).