"There was a huge cultural difference." The Lithuanian pet store chain explained why their work in Belarus didn't pan out
The Lithuanian company Kika Group, which specializes in pet products, celebrates its 35th anniversary this year. Its founders Janita Januškauskaitė-Plungienė and Tauras Plungė told LRT in an interview about business development, successes in Estonia, and their experience working in Belarus, where they once had 35 stores, but later sold this business.
Kika Group, which has been operating in the market since the early 1990s, now has 122 stores in Lithuania and Estonia. Janita Januškauskaitė-Plungienė calls the Estonian direction one of the projects that has stood the test of time. However, the Belarusian experience was negative.
"We also tried to enter Belarus. We had 35 stores there. 18 years ago, there was a huge influx of Lithuanians specifically into Belarus. It was a trend then.
However, each country has its own cultural heritage, its own understanding, absolutely different galaxies. There is no such thing that the same practice that works in Lithuania will work there too. You have to manage staff differently, present products to customers differently, and offer a specific assortment.
It's good that we managed to sell the business in Belarus in time. We sold it because there was an immeasurable cultural difference. People who returned to Lithuania after living there from Monday to Friday were "drained" — that's how I can put it. I saw no sense in doing business just for money," said Janita Januškauskaitė-Plungienė.
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А в общем да, успех в одной стране не гарантирует успеха в другой.
Например, успешная в куче стран фирма pizza hut дважды пыталась работать в Австрии и так и не смогла.
А супеуспешный в Японии RAKUTEN (который купил вайбер) пытался работать в Германии и провалился со своей очень странной для европейского рынка моделью: вместо скидок сразу надо было покупать за полную стоимость, потом начислялось нечто типа кэшбэка, но этот кэшбэк пропадал за месяц-два, и на него можно было мало купить учитывая высокие цены