Coca-Cola in India Case
1) What aspects of US and Indian culture may have been a cause of Coke’s difficulties in India?
No two cultures are the same in the world. American culture is quite different from Indian culture. America has a mixture of different cultures while Indian culture is unique and has its own values.
Enormity of India
American is a fully developed country with primarily western culture. The country is also considered as a melting pot due to large-scale immigration from many different countries throughout its history. The cultural diversity is not so great as in India.
India is a big and poor developing country with different varieties in geographical features, resources, climate conditions and ancient civilizations including four major religions: Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. There is great cultural diversity throughout the country. The South, North, and Northeast each has own distinct cultures and almost every state has its own cultural niche.
In Indian rural areas, there is a high scarcity of drinking water. If those poor Indians can’t drink enough water, drinking Coke has no meaning to them. Rural consumption habit and buying capacity are also different from urban people. To most poor rural Indians, Coke is a luxury and may only afford to buy one bottle once a year.
Indians concern great values to trust and quality. For urban population, price sensitive consumers want the quality thing at cheap price and does not accept any price quality trade-offs.
Communication:
There are different ways and styles of communication in each country. A message could be translated completely opposite to what was meant. US style communication may be completely not accepted in India. US has a low low-context culture in which communication is more direct and explicit without any implied or common rules. Yet India is a high-context culture in which communications has implied messages to be explained only by the context of the culture.
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No two cultures are the same in the world. American culture is quite different from Indian culture. America has a mixture of different cultures while Indian culture is unique and has its own values.
Enormity of India
American is a fully developed country with primarily western culture. The country is also considered as a melting pot due to large-scale immigration from many different countries throughout its history. The cultural diversity is not so great as in India.
India is a big and poor developing country with different varieties in geographical features, resources, climate conditions and ancient civilizations including four major religions: Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. There is great cultural diversity throughout the country. The South, North, and Northeast each has own distinct cultures and almost every state has its own cultural niche.
In Indian rural areas, there is a high scarcity of drinking water. If those poor Indians can’t drink enough water, drinking Coke has no meaning to them. Rural consumption habit and buying capacity are also different from urban people. To most poor rural Indians, Coke is a luxury and may only afford to buy one bottle once a year.
Indians concern great values to trust and quality. For urban population, price sensitive consumers want the quality thing at cheap price and does not accept any price quality trade-offs.
Communication:
There are different ways and styles of communication in each country. A message could be translated completely opposite to what was meant. US style communication may be completely not accepted in India. US has a low low-context culture in which communication is more direct and explicit without any implied or common rules. Yet India is a high-context culture in which communications has implied messages to be explained only by the context of the culture.
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References: 1. http://www.thecoca-colacompany.com/citizenship/index.html 2. Coca-Cola India, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, 2004-1-0085, Jennifer Kaye, T’05, under the direction of Professor Paul A. Argenti 3. Coca-Cola India Corporate Social Responsibility Strategy, Hadiya Faheem, 2009