The last month has seen more diamonds of economic news than there are in Cullinan mine. While British retail remains patchy, UK and other European companies selling “luxury” have done phenomenally well on the global stage. They have reaped dividends of promotion in emerging economies, especially in the Asia-Pacific region, targeting High Net Worth Individuals or those aspiring to perceived luxury.

Translation plays no small part in this global success: research has shown that the majority of consumers will only buy from websites with information presented in their language. This effect becomes more pronounced the higher the value of the product or service. (see Can’t Read, Won’t Buy: Why Language Matters, Common Sense Advisory)

A few news snippets illustrate the trend:

Paul Smith smartens up profits
Paul Smith, the fashion designer famed for his smart suits and signature rainbow stripes, has notched up a 31 per cent increase in pre-tax profits…
Turnover increased 15 per cent to £171.6m, but international sales were the star performer, rising 16 per cent in Europe, and 15.5 per cent in the rest of the world. By contrast, UK sales rose by just over 7 per cent.
Financial Times

Bentley leads convoy for mini-recovery in UK car production
December PMI figures and Bentley’s 37% global sales rise bring a little new year cheer to European stockmarkets
The luxury carmaker Bentley has defied the economic gloom with a 37% surge in global sales, producing a sparkling set of figures for 2011, powered by rising sales to China and the United States. It has forecast strong growth this year.
The Guardian

Ferragamo takes a sexy step on the red carpet
Asia-Pacific accounts for 36 percent of Salvatore Ferragamo’s global sales from January to September 2011. Paul Cadman, Ferragamo’s regional chief executive officer for Asia Pacific, says “The biggest challenge we foresee is how we will be able to keep up with the demand for our products given our forecast for the region for 2012. Our China market alone grew by 50 percent from January to September of 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010. Growth is what we anticipate for the region with our expansion plans, especially in China.”
The Philippine Star

China boosts Rolls Royce sales
Rolls-Royce said sales in Asia-Pacific grew 47pc in 2011. China is now its largest market. Sales in Germany and Russia more than doubled. Torsten Müller-Ötvös, chief executive, said “Our business is in excellent shape. We are developing our dealer network, moving into new markets like South America”
Daily Telegraph

China: number one for Rolls-Royce
Rolls-Roycerevealed that in 2011, for the first time ever, China over took the US as its biggest market. Arndt Ellinghorst, an analyst at Credit Suisse, pointed to South Korea, Turkey and South America as regions where demand was likely to expand rapidly. The proportion of sales across the luxury vehicle universe from “non-traditional” markets could grow to 60-70 per cent of total sales, he added.
Financial Times beyondbrics blog

This trend is not just present in exports but also in sales within the UK – to those who have travelled here.

Foreign tourists have boosted profits at top London store Harvey Nichols by 32 percent. Harrods saw a 39 percent rise, with Chinese visitors spending an average of £3,500 per visit. With an eye on this market, Burberry has spent £20m upgrading its London stores. Angela Ahrendts, Burberry’s chief executive explained to the Financial Times recently, “When Chinese consumers travel, they spend six times more than when they stay at home. Saying ‘I bought this in London’ adds further cachet.”

The effect extends beyond London too, at least as far as the Oxfordshire town Bicester – which boasts the only station in the UK with signs signs translated into Chinese and Arabic. The designer outlet centre Bicester Village is now the UK’s third-biggest tourist shopping destination after Harrods and Selfridges. Visitor numbers are expected to exceed 5.5m in 2012, with 40 percent of shoppers coming from outside of the EU and some two-thirds coming from outside the UK.

So, what conclusions should we draw from all this?

First, any brand that considers its products positioned at the premium or luxury end of the continuum should start taking emerging markets seriously. Of course, Arabic, Russian and Japanese remain key languages to be addressing consumers in but the list is expanding to include Chinese, Brazilian Portuguese and more.

Secondly, the “blank slate” of these markets provides an opportunity for brand transformation and hegemony – I wrote last year about wealthy Chinese tourists and Clarks shoes.

Finally, the internet is a cost effective place to start. Many companies get a shock when they see the number of non-English speakers among their existing visitors, never mind potential new ones. Isn’t it about time we started speaking to this global audience in their language?

Pic: By Ricardo Stuckert/PR (Agência Brasil [1]) [CC-BY-2.5-br], via Wikimedia Commons



Will translation rescue London businesses from the morass of the UK economy? A report today by the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry shows a difficult last few months for London business, but concludes that part of the solution is reaching out globally to growing economies.

Most of the key performance indicators for London’s businesses fell in the third quarter of 2011, according to the LCCI’s latest Quarterly Economic Survey. London businesses saw sales and orders in both domestic and export markets fall significantly.

The report [.pdf] notes confidence figures at an individual company level remained relatively steady in Q3, but confidence in the UK’s economic situation fell drastically.

Interviewed on the BBC, Colin Stanbridge, Chief Executive of the LCCI, said, “London business have to get out to places where economy is growing.”

He commented further on these results:

“There are economies beyond Europe experiencing huge surges in consumer demand, not least in Brazil, China and Russia. The business community and the government must work together to harness these opportunities for UK firms.”

You can read the full article (or syndicate the text for your own website) on Buzzle:
How Translation Helps Business Survive Recession in the UK

In the end the deal did not go through as Zabeel are looking to concentrate on investing in property and tourism nearer home. It all made me think about how, in this time of world economic gloom, oil rich Middle East companies look set to try to diversify.

In the United Arab Emirates alone, there is currently around £200 billion worth of active construction projects while the Dubai International Financial Centre aims to massively expand the financial sector with tax, rent and regulatory breaks. Meanwhile the Palm Islands are a massive real estate and tourism development – the largest land reclamation project in the world, increasing Dubai’s shoreline by 520 km. All of this has made the United Arab Emirates one of the fastest growing economies in the world, with some estimates putting GDP growth in 2006 at a staggering 35 percent.

The vast sums of money are not restricted to the Arab world as business opportunities are sought out around the world. So we see Barclays bank raising £7.3 billion from Middle East investors. Other famous names that have seen an influx of Arabic capital include P&O, Aston Martin and Madame Tussauds.

In these times of doom and gloom news stories, it’s no wonder that such growth, investment and let’s face it, plain cash, is catching people’s attention and many other companies have their eyes set on pulling in some of that investment.

All of which probably goes to explain why we have been inundated with Arabic translation and typesetting over the last few weeks!