In India 10 per cent of the population can consume on a level with most Americans and Western Europeans, says management guru Peter Drucker. That s 70 million people - a bigger market than any country in Europe. And selling to Third World countries is easy too. Target the impressionable kids, the aspiring young, anyone who s prepared to believe that all things fashionably Western must be good. In Hong Kong and Manila some primary schools even have contracts with hamburger chains who sell their products on school premises.
Few countries can resist the onslaught.
But most cultures succumb eventually. Powerful stuff, this advertising. Sometimes I wonder if people have a primal, instinctive craving for hamburgers. Something hot and juicy and so utterly simple you can eat it with your hands. I mean, I know some people who don t eat burgers.