2 International marketing Coffee culture STI © Answer these questions. 4 Which hot drinks are popular in your country? 2 Whatis your favourite hot drink? 3 Which five words do you associate with coffee? Coffee culture comes to coffee-growers By John Authers and Mark Mulligan 1m Chile, they prefer tea to coffee and instant rather ‘than freshly brewed. Tn Argentina, by contrast, ‘reakfast Is with a frothy ‘cappuccino, aheart starting espresso, ora caff latte. In Brazil after dinner cotfoo is served free at any self respecting restaurant, ‘That Latln Ameria lenot fone great homogeneous culture often surprises travellers: However, even the most subte differences Intheconsumer rote ot Colombian anda Veneauelan wil not have boon lost on Starbucks, ane of the fastest-growing ‘lobal brands ‘After searches for local partners, and a successful teal run in Mexieo City, Starbucks arrived in South, ‘America. With. no conventional advertising, the Seattle based company opened Stores in Lima and Santiago within 24 hours ofeach other Neither Peru nor Chile ‘bas a. mass-market caf’ culture although Baropean ‘and USstyle caffee houses ‘have begun springing upin the upmarket districts of both their capital, Despite this “cultural peculiarity, @ Starbucks survey found that Chileans ‘on average drink anly 150 cups of coffee a. year, compared with 345 in the US ‘and more than twice that ‘number in many Buropean ‘countries. Of the 800s of coffee per capita bought in speciality shops each year 0 per ean of itis instant. Tn Argentina, per capita consumption is about dksa 5 year, mostly in whole or found coffee beans Despite being a coffee. grower, Poru has a similar pattem of coffee consumption. The irony is not lost on Jalio Gutierrez, head of Latin America at Starbucks. Coffee International. We've 6 been doing business in alin America fur dates, hesays‘Wehaven't had any stores but we've boca duying Latin American 70 eaffee since the beginning” “Expansion will depend entirely on how longit takes ‘to find the right partner in ch of those countries: he rs says. "ll we dont find anyone, we may thinkabout sing in ourselves ‘Anyone who knows the Starbucks story canalready sw visualise potential outlets fn the most fashionable neighbourhoods of "the region's capital etios From 4 single store in Seattle's Pike Place Market in 1971, Starbucks today owns 3907 stores in North America and licences a further 1578 ‘They also own 487 ‘and on franchise 1,180 outlets in the rest of the word Tt frst expanded from its home market to Japan in 1906 and Is now present in more than 30. countries, Last year alone, the Starbucks livingoamina- coffeehouse format. Was Introduced to. Mexico, Supermarkets and’ from wo Germany, Spain, Austria, Puerto Rico, Greece, Oman, Indonesia "and southera China, Starbucks ‘comers’ orminiutlets are found i tos alrline offices, sports stadiums, airports, hotels and bookshops. Copy-cat offeebar chains have femorsed. only to. be aio swallowed by Starbucks or foreed to merge with ‘competitors. Fortune and fame, however, have not come nis without thelr erties. Some analysts say the company was forced to. globalise ‘nocause It had saturated its hhome market. Others say 120 the Japanese experience thas not been a happy one, Security concems forced the company to retreat from Israel, and the anti 125 globalisation movement now has Starbueks stores nits hitist. TInaspiring societies such as Chile and Mexico, American companies are ‘generally well regarded and any novelty from abroad is fuaranteed to arouse uss Both the Lima and Santiago Starbucks have bboen packed since opening thelr doors, and. the company has rolled out 15, 140 stores in Mexico City since launching its frst-cleverly located beside the US embassy —a year ago, Roman Perey-Miranda, head of Latin America for Interbrand, agrees. ‘Mexico Istheclosest Latin America gels to. the US, both oopraphically "and 1s culturally’ he says, Tt was fan obvious starting-point {or Starbses inthe region? ‘From the Financial Times FINANCIAL TIMES