Longcloud Lamb is a company, specializing in chilled and frozen New Zealand lamb and goat products with a difference: it was organic and exceeded animal welfare stipulations in major export markets. The company manages current wholesale customers in export markets using an e-commerce platform. Sarah Elder is Longcloud’s marketing director. She was looking for a better website in order to target new markets and present on-line offers in different languages. This case is talking about some issues in regards to e-commerce and language in an international business. The four questions of the case will help to deal with these issues.

The first question is in which ways culture, religion and language may influence foreign marketing operations in the organic meat business. Meat does not mean the same thing whether you live in a developed country, like U.S, or in a developing one, like India. For example, for most people in the U.S., meat can be a daily meal. They care more about the balance of nutrition. They may be willing to pay more for an organic meat to be living healthier. However, for some people in India, it is still not easy to have meat on their dinner tables every day. To them, meat is just an essential component of survival, nothing more. In their case, there is no possibility that they will pay more money to look for organic meat. Another factor which will affect the meat market is religion. Muslims are not allowed to eat pigs, cows are treated with sincere reverence in India, and Most Buddhists are vegetarian. In addition, some countries have very strict rules in regards to meat import because of some diseases caused by meat, like mad cow in England and bird flu in China. Although Longcloud is mostly about lamb meat, they still need to pay attention to the different rules in different countries. Language can also influence the foreign market