New York Eatery Looks for The Sweet Spot Overseas

ABSTRACT:

Chocolate Bar, a New York eatery and candy store, has two locations in the city and one in New Jersey. Although the expectations were to expand inside the U.S., its owner, Ms. Nelson, has just signed a deal in the Middle East. Under this deal, Ms. Ghorbial and her husband founded Gourmet Company, which is structured as a Chocolate Bar licensee.

It all started when Ms. Ghorbial, a Dubai-based investor, called Ms. Nelson because interested in a partnership that would bring high-end chocolate to the region’s increasingly worldly consumer class. In spite of Ms. Nelson’s initial hesitation, Ms. Ghorbial succeeded in closing the deal. She explained how the Arabic consumer is becoming more and more globalized thanks to Internet and satellite TV. Middle-Easterners are also fascinated by the prestige of European and American brands. Besides, while Americans are cutting back on discretionary purchases because of the economic slowdown, the Middle East consumer class is growing and is eager to buy high-end products, such as chocolate. The two parties negotiated for about nine months and reached an agreement in August 2006. Ms. Ghorbial and her husband will open 30 stores across the region in the next 10 years, starting with Dubai.

After closing the deal, Ms. Nelson started to adapt her products to this new and unfamiliar market. She produced more milk and white chocolate, the favorites in the region. She created big platters for gift-giving, since Middle-Easterners use chocolate to celebrate important occasions. Because Muslims don’t eat pork, she also removed prosciutto from her menus. Furthermore, she adapted the stores to the local culture. So each store will have smaller and more distant tables to allow more privacy and will also provide isolated banquettes for women. Adjustments were also necessary in the way Ms. Nelson operates. She learned to do business the Arabic way, which requires long meetings, hours of phone calls and no internet search.

Despite the time-consuming set-up process, Ms. Nelson is sure she has made the right move.

LINK:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122047376978596329.html