It’s Not Too Expensive; You’re Just Too Cheap

How’s that for a great slogan. I saw it on the side of a Stone Brewery truck here in Escondido. This is an appropriate slogan for a brewery that produces Arrogant Bastard Beer.

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It’s a great beer by the way. I love local breweries. When I was in Boston I drank Harpoon beer. When I moved to Escondido I wondered what I would do without my favorite local brewery. And then I discovered Stone.

What does all this have to do with globalization? Not much, except I can’t help wondering if I would have been as excited about Stone had it not been local. It’s a great beer no matter where it’s from, but there is always something a little extra special about knowing that you’re supporting a local institution.

I study the localization of products and Web sites a great deal and I’ve seen companies succeed by doing it well, but I also suspect that there is only so much a company can do to compete against truly local companies, like a Stone Brewery.

John Yunker
John Yunker

John is co-founder of Byte Level Research and author of Think Outside the Country as well as 19 editions of The Web Globalization Report Card.

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