Cigarette shop, tea shop, shoe shop, cigarette shop, tea shop, shoe shop, cigarette shop, tea shop, shoe shop.

Walk down most streets in China, and you can’t help but be struck by déjà vu, over and over again.

The sameness of products and lack of marketing effort add to the feeling.

What is so obvious in the West – advertising, setting yourself apart from the competition, uniqueness of products – might be considered an eyesore to streets in the East.

I never quite understood the rationale behind this kind of Chinese thinking, but certainly, there are a helluva lot of people to sell to in China. Perhaps selling lubrication just to one’s large, extended family could make for a well-oiled living, even without the pizzazz of say, K-Y.

Still, things are changing.

The Wall Street Journal reports that China’s economic crisis is causing some to rethink parochial Chinese habits like selling one near nameless thing one’s whole life.

The article notes:

Chongqing Linsheng Industry & Trade Co., which has made motorcycle parts for 13 years, is considering launching a line of mechanical self-shuffling mah-jongg tables. In Wenzhou, shoe-factory employees are now churning out light-emitting diodes, and in Shenzhen, a maker of plastic signs shut down briefly and then reopened as a maker of decorative holiday decals.

The emphasis behind the innovation likely isn’t a new crop of MBA graduates specializing in entrepreneurship. Rather, the Chinese mind may be awakening to innovation because of their practical, Confucius-grounded nature.

“In Chinese we have a saying that ‘it’s easier for small boats to turn around,’” Eric Wu, general manager of manufacturer and exporter Duolilong (H.K.) Industrial Co., based in Shenzhen, told the Wall Street Journal. The company has switched gears from making fans to manufacturing battery chargers to finally, and interestingly, creating energy-saving power tools.

All over China, export business is down along, turning once-profitable products into warehouse refuse. To survive, these businesses must reinvent.

“If we don’t change, then we have no hope,” Mr. Wu told the Journal.

Larger companies are doing even better with creativity.

Haier, for instance, has manufactured large 12 kg washing machine for Saudis “so that they can wash their voluminous robes,” according to Beijing Review. The company also designs “fridges that double as study tables for Indian students,” the Review notes.

Enter the foreign designers, like “s. point design,” based in Shanghai.

“The company…has created a water dispensing system that draws water from the atmosphere, using a membrane filtration system, eliminating the need for refilling,” the Review notes.

Now that is something a little different from cigarettes, tea and shoes.

    Channel: What's Spicy     |