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betrant from B.!.H. Journal Dby 1936
Trade with China
Bright Prospects of Hong Kong Fair
SUCCESSFUL B.I.H. MEETING
MANY
ANY bookings have already been made for the British Empire and China Trade Fair, which is being organised in this country from British Industries House by Mrs. Beatrice Thompson, Managing Director of the Advertising and Publicity Bureau Ltd., of Hong Kong. Among the bookings is one
MRS. BEATRICE THOMPSON
Mrs.
by the Medical Section of British Industries House, and some tenants of which are co-operating in a joint exhibit. There are prob- ably other tenants who would like to participate, and these are asked to communicate with Mrs. Thompson at British In- dustries House. Thompson is at present on a tour of the provinces, where meetings with manufacturers are being arranged for her by the Chambers of Commerce. A highly successful meeting of more than 100 manu- facturers was addressed by Mrs. Thompson at British Industries House on January 24th, Sir Francis Good- enough, C.B.E., presiding. In an interesting discussion which followed a remarkable confirmation of Mrs. Thomp- son's views as to the strength of the Chinese "class" market was forthcoming from Mr. D. W. Tobin, a manu- facturer who commenced selling in South China twelve months ago. The products they sold, he said, were the most expensive of their kind. It was impossible to make them less expensive because the most up-to-date and scientific machinery and the best material were used. Yet his firm was making progress far beyond expectations. He was much impressed by a letter from his representative saying that he was surprised at the way the Chinese were buying during the period of financial stress. He thought that whereas in good times the Chinese might not mind so much what they bought, to-day they were carefully choosing the expensive article under the conviction that it would prove more economical in the long run.
Mrs. Thompson observed that this was precisely the point she was trying to bring home.
At the outset Sir Francis Goodenough read a letter from Sir Thomas Southorn, K.B.E., C.M.G., Colonial Secretary of Hong Kong, introducing Mrs. Thompson and asking for support for the Fair. The Fair would, he was sure, be of great benefit to British trade.
Sir Francis said that the Fair needed at this stage the support of British manufacturers, and in giving this manu- facturers should bear in mind the increasing competition from other countries now evident in South China.
In her address Mrs. Thompson spoke first of the radical difference between the Southern and the Northern Chinese, and what this implies in terms of trade. Southern Chinese,
she said, formed 50 per cent. of the total population of Malaya and controlled 90 per cent. of the trade. This meant that the whole of this territory became, from the merchant's point of view, one homogeneous trading area.
Now (she continued) the fact that a rich section of the greatest undeveloped market in the world, peopled by the most enterprising section of the Chinese, is linked so closely with the British people, is surely one that merits our closest attention. What are we in Great Britain doing to profit by this opportunity? Do we even realise what a specially favoured position we hold in South China ? Admittedly there are many obstacles hindering the development of British trade with the Chinese--political, economic and social. Supposing every one of these were to be swept away by a stroke of the pen, very little improvement would be shown, unless and until British exporters altered their methods to those which are, rightly considered, essential when desiring to do business with any other country in the world.
Those methods may be summed up in the phrase: Establishing Direct Contact with the Customers. Direct Contact implies a knowledge of the customer's needs, habits, likes and dislikes: how to dress up the sales story, so that he will stop to read it and act on it. Where and how to place this sales story so as to reach the maximum number of potential customers with the minimum of If this Direct Contact could be established, it would be found that many of these obstacles that to-day prevent the expansion of our trade with the Chinese were not so insuperable as they now appear; many of them would yield easily to treatment and difficulties would fade away. In brief, Direct Contact would bring first-hand information and knowledge of the Southern Chinese Market to Britain and the Empire.
waste.
UP AND DOING
Britain and the Empire need China as a market and therefore must take the necessary steps to call the attention of the Chinese buyers to what they manufacture and produce in competition with the rest of the world, and must study the needs of these potential customers, and further it is equally important that the British should buy more from China to enable her to show the British Empire how greatly she has progressed in her production. She needs all the assistance and co-operation that the West can give in strengthening and re-building her shattered trade. Why should it not be British co-operation? The British Empire and China Trade Fair will provide the opportunity for each of the two great trading people to apply their great trading and business ability towards the solving of their mutual problems.
We have in Hong Kong an outpost of British influence and culture set right at the entrance to a wonderfully rich and friendly portion of China. But we must not leave it to Hong Kong to act as our mouthpiece, or to take the initiative in interpreting Young China and the New Britain to each other.
All that has happened in North China is making it easier for us to form closer connections with the Chinese people through South China. It may be that we have to sit back and watch our markets in North China destroyed-who can say? Are the British going to allow their special standing in the South, the proffered friendship of the Southern Chinese people who know us best, and the accumulated goodwill of years, to go for naught-- for lack of the vision to see that Young China is going through the throes of a new birth, and is seeking for all the sympathy and understanding she can find?
Is it not significant that only a month ago the German ambassa- dor to China spent many days in visiting the Kwangtung Province ? German experts and German goods are found in all the Govern- ment's numerous offices and bureaux ? Is it not significant that at the beginning of December, the Japanese Foreign Office took steps to establis
Japanese News agency in Canton, for the dissemination
5 the Chinese press and with the professed object "to pave the way towards Sino-Japanese friendship and co-operation"?
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The genesis of the British Empire and China Trade Fair was the realisation of facts such as these (said Mrs. Thompson). Having described how the Fair was suggested by her firm, how it gained the support of the Hong Kong Government and had since got influential support in this country, she described the steps that will be taken to bring buyers to the Fair, and continued:
I have had flung at me in Manchester that Lancashire's trade in China has alarmingly diminished. Granted, it is no use playing ostrich and pretending otherwise. Manchester has
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definitely lost that market for cheap grade textiles, but certainly not for her high-class lines which Japan has not yet taken up- even if Japan did try to get in on high-class textiles she would not meet with any measure of success with the wealthy and educated classes who will not buy Japanese if they can help it. I propose that Manchester manufacturers take a combined stand at this Fair to sell the better class Chinese the quality goods she pro- duces, to meet and discuss Manchester problems with these Chinese, extend all possible help to increase China's exports so that there may be more money with which to buy imports.
In brief, why Manchester should take part in this Trade Fair is not solely for what she can sell from her stand, but to enable her leaders to meet the Chinese leaders, and arrange future dealings on a basis of mutual benefit and particularly to seize the opportunity of coming out and seeing New China of 1936 at first hand.
APPEAL TO LANCASHIRE
Manchester has been told many conflicting things about China, the stories being backed unfortunately by glaring statistics. Figures must, of course, be taken into consideration, but all the same what is Manchester going to do about it--and how does she propose to deal with these facts? Is she proposing to fold her hands and say, "Allah's will be done?" She says she has been told certain conditions exist in China--well and good. Then I urge her to use this Trade Fair for testing for herself the truth of what she has been told, and secondly for devising means on the spot to cope with the condition of affairs existing to-day. Our ancestors did not build up their businesses by only listening to what they were told.
This Trade Fair must be looked upon as a means to an end and not as an end in itself-a vital link in the development scheme.
This is the first step. Immediately the Fair is closed, when all the visitors have returned to the country and whilst what they have seen and heard is still fresh in their minds, a systematic follow-up publicity campaign should be put into force in the interior of South China where there are ten million potential customers for Western products to be found.
In conclusion Mrs. Thompson said: I am convinced that the spirit of British enterprise that our forefathers had in building up our great Empire is in you as well. If after all I have said to you to-day you are still hesitating to take the necessary step forward, let me tell you as one who has worked for thirteen years amongst the Chinese in every progressive and even primitive town of the interior of South China, introducing well-known British lines, that the potentialities are there to be developed if you will only adopt the right methods.
On Sir Francis Goodenough's vacating the chair to fulfil another engagement, Mr. A. J. C. Walters (Controller, British Industries House) took the chair, and explained that British Industries House was supporting the Fair in pursuance of its duty to assist manufacturers with any proposition that was likely to assist trade.
After Mrs. Thompson had answered a number of questions, Sir Cecil Clementi, former Governor of Hong Kong and of the Straits Settlements, spoke on the necessity of British traders preparing themselves for the Southern Chinese markets. They should learn the requisite Chinese language-not so difficult as might be thought. He was entirely in favour of the Fair, he said, and thought it was overdue. Manufacturers who exhibited would have an entirely friendly welcome and, moreover, an honest deal. It was r
case, he added, that the Japanese were succeeding in China only with cheap goods, but also with better-class goods, in which British manufacturers should be better able to meet them.
Mr. D. W. Tobin then gave (as recorded at the beginning of this report) the happy experience of his firm in selling high-class products in South China.
The meeting then carried unanimously a resolution to the effect that the Fair is worthy of the sympathetic atten- tion of British manufacturers. Thanks to the chairman and speakers were expressed by Mr. Donnelly (British Celanese).