Yearender: A Billion Buyers: China's vast market potential lures foreign businesses

January 2, 2012

BEIJING, Dec. 31 (Xinhua) -- When a British businessman said in the 1840s, "if we could only persuade every person in China to lengthen his shirt-tail by a foot, we could keep the mills of Lancashire working round the clock," he saw the potential of Chinese consumers, but didn't foresee the emergence of a new ideology -- Made for China-ism.

Unlike the British man, the current generation of business people act instead of think. What if China, brimming with a population of over 1.3 billion, becomes a major consuming nation?

To woo consumers, from KFC's crispy Youtiao, a traditional Chinese snack for breakfast, Hermes' China brand Shangxia to BMW's China-only limited version of the M3 Tiger, more and more foreign firms have launched new products or brands custom-made for China.

Others, such as the Italy-based sunglass giant Luxottica Group, established their design hubs in China.

Even Apple changed its traditional line of "Designed in California, Made in China" to "Designed in California, Made for China" on the giveaway T-shirts when it opened a new store in Shanghai.

"This Made-for-China phenomenon is just one of the many sub-trends spawned by the macro trend of economic and consumption power shifting toward emerging markets," according to a report by the trend research company Trendwatching.com.

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