Aiming for China's Big Market with a Focus on Export Expansion in the Asian Region

Q.Why did your company decide to take on interns? What did you aim to achieve?

Since our founding in 1911 more than 100 years ago, we have operated a Japan-wide confection wholesale business based in Hokkaido. The domestic market is currently undergoing a gradual contraction as a result of Japan's declining population. Consequently, we are aiming to expand exports of our products to the Asian region and we established a new business department in Tokyo in April 2018. For starters, we were able to deliver products to Thailand, but following this we were aiming for the Chinese market, which is much bigger in scale. However, we did not have any employees who were well versed on the Chinese market or export conditions and there was no prospect of making a Chinese market business concrete. That is when we learned of the existence of the internship program. We decided to apply to the program, reasoning that by taking on an intern from China we would obtain insights for the new business and knowledge of the Chinese market and we would be able to gain a foothold for advancing into the Chinese market.

Creating Proposals that Reach Chinese Consumers and Actively Participating in Business Negotiations

Q.What kind of internship did you run? What difficulties did you face and how did you resolve them?

We asked that our intern carry out three activities. The first was product development aimed at the Chinese market. The intern had roughly 10 years of employment history with a Japanese company in the food manufacturing industry so, after performing a marketing survey of Chinese consumers, she created a concept proposal for a private label product and made the proposal to the company. The second activity was to handle negotiations at the exhibition in October. Since many buyers from China visit on this day, we had the intern be in charge of negotiations with buyers and follow up after negotiations. The third activity was proposing PR using social networking sites and surveys of sales channels and Chinese export laws. We tried hard to create an environment where the intern could easily express her views. We often prepared a place for free discussion with employees so as to be able to draw out forthright, honest opinions. By having the intern state her honest opinion, we believe that the employees were also able to speak their minds freely and that this contributed to the stimulation of our company.

Opening a Way into the Chinese Market Through Achievable Proposals and Informational Capabilities

Q.Comparing before and after the internship, what effects did it have on you, your employees, or your organization?

Thanks to our intern, we were able to acquire an enormous amount of information and knowledge related to Chinese business. Because our intern had a long career in the Chinese food manufacturing industry, we learned a lot from her, including Chinese business etiquette and how to approach buyers. Additionally, we obtained realistic information that we would never have known about if we didn't have our intern, such as communication with buyers and product PR using WeChat which is a necessity since China has developed its own unique social networking services. Furthermore, we had the intern present on surveys and proposals as necessary and the proposals were highly achievable, tailored to the Chinese market. We were continually amazed by the capabilities of the intern. We had just created a section for entering the Chinese market and we were starting from scratch, but thanks to the intern we went from scratch to something solid and it felt like we had managed to open a way into the Chinese market in one go. Additionally, we believe that we were able to increase enthusiasm among our employees as well by having them work with superior foreign personnel. Our initial goal was to gain a foothold for advancing into the Chinese market, but we are exceptionally satisfied by how the internship stimulated the company.