Barbie certainly decided to make a splash when entering the Chinese market. Mattel’s blonde, waif-like doll celebrated her 50th anniversary by opening its first ever dedicated store. A gala event to mark the launch included movie stars Jet Li and Christy Chung, while the store includes a Design Center for children to create their own dolls.
The high-profile roll-out marks a major drive by Mattel to focus on the Chinese market amid tougher times in its home territory - fourth-quarter sales in the US were down 11 per cent. Its China strategy, say observers, holds important lessons for other MNCs targeting the market.
The prize for Barbie is the current generation of sibling-less Chinese children arising from the one-child family policy - the so-called ‘little Emperor’ generation with nobody to play with but with parents and grandparents eager to indulge them.
It enters a market with few direct competitors. According to Shaun Rein, MD of China Market Research Group, the concept of a doll is relatively new to Chinese children, meaning Mattel has an education job on its hands.
Seth Grossman, MD for Eastern China at Carat, the media agency that worked on the launch, argues that Barbie’s extended brand should play well in the market. “There are no big brands competing with Barbie in China, as Barbie is more than just a toy, but a whole story with movie, books and cartoons,” he says. “All the other competitors are just toys.”
Interestingly, the focus in China is not just children. The store targets older women too with an adult Barbie Boutique, Barbie-branded apparel for women and a variety of Barbie-inspired accessories, all of which have been developed specifically for China. There’s even a Barbie-themed bar.
Laura Lai, general manager at Barbie (Shanghai) Commercial, confirms that the brand’s Shanghai strategy is “demand-creation” in a market where parents have no memory of Barbie from when they were growing up.
She adds: “Barbie is a relatively new brand to the market so we needed a way to condense almost five decades of brand history into a single experience. As China as a whole isn’t a television advertising-reliant market for children’s brands, we needed an innovative approach to reaching girls and their parents that could create an almost immediate relationship for the brand with consumers.”
Rein argues that expanding the Barbie brand to parents - a tactic that has not been used in any other market - is an intelligent move as the brand seeks local relevance, given that key consumer groups in China are aged 22 to 28. However, he questions its appeal to women who have never come across the brand before. “It’s smart but it will be difficult to make it work - though it’s good that the brand is trying,” he says.
The approach Barbie is taking can apply to many overseas brands, according to David Wolf, CEO of Wolf Group Asia. “A part of branding that is frequently overlooked by new entrants in China is the importance of creating an experience around the brand,” he says. “When you bring your brand to China, you must be prepared to build it from the ground up.”
In developing its own retail space to ensure it can control the customer experience of the brand, the House of Barbie is following the example of brands such as Louis Vuitton, Apple, Motorola, BMW and adidas.
“The effort in doing this is not cheap,” warns Wolf. “But when measured against the cost of a handful of television ads, when properly accentuated by a coherent marketing plan, these stores become priceless anchors for brands in China.”
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