INTRODUCTION
Recently, Tesco announced that the firm was ending its US venture. Indeed, Tesco appears to be the most recent British retailer to have encountered with failure in the US. Indeed, over the past decades, several major firms such as Sainsbury’s have been compelled to review their overseas ventures (Butler, 2012). These firms have incurred significant deficits in their quest for a new market. However, there seems to be evidence that some of these companies have been able to establish themselves in some foreign markets. For example, Tesco has failed in Japan but has proved to be a success in South Korea.
Over this past century, there has been an evident emergence of multinational retail corporations. The general philosophy of these companies has been economically driven, that is, to prosper in terms of sales revenue and to expand globally while acquiring maximum market shares. The most dominant firm in this aspect is U.S. based Wal-Mart that leads with sales revenue exceeding $466.1 billion in 2012, followed by French based Carrefour with income of $112.6 billion (Forbes, 2013). They are trailed by U.K based Tesco at $96.8 billion and by Germany’s Metro in fourth place with sales of $90.5 billion (Forbes, 2013). The common strategy of these stated firms has been to target their marketing efforts towards rapidly emerging countries by investing in the establishment of foreign branches.
An emerging market can be defined as an economy which is in the process of a shift into an open and global economy. There are numerous factors contributing to firms opting for ventures in these countries. According to Forbes (2013), emerging markets may contribute to nearly three quarters of the world economical growth for the coming years. Moreover, the Asian population, which represents almost half of the world’s population, is surrounded by emerging markets with countries