It’s day three at the Hong Kong Gifts and Premiums Fair, where I’m swimming in thousands of exhibitor booths from all around the world. This is truly an amazing experience…can’t fathom how anyone could physically walk this entire thing in a week.
Yesterday’s seminar “Outlook for the US Market After the Financial Tsunami” (their choice of title) was met with very open ears and a lot of curiosity-—not surprising, given the international nature of this show. From the podium, I could see people frantically taking notes as I detailed the American consumer psyche, what it craves now, and where it’s headed next. When I turned to discussion about the various retail channels and how they’re viewed from a consumer perspective, pens really flew. Was good to see an interest in independent retail as opposed to the typical big box mentality.
What did surprise me, however, was the first question during the Q&A that followed. Thankfully, one of the organizers mentioned the possibility, but still it seemed odd when an audience member asked my thoughts about the swine flu and its possible impact on the US economy.
It wasn’t until later that the full context hit me. This is a country that dealt with both SARS and the bird flu, the former of which caused China commerce to all but grind to a halt. The impact of both was devastating, on a personal and commercial level. Their nation paid dearly.
Given the tenuous health of today’s economy, and how closely Chinese interests are tied to our financial markets, we should expect them to be deeply interested in our response to current outbreaks on US soil, not to mention what our prevention plans are to stave off potential damage. They’ve been there. Done that. And they remember.
This morning, I downloaded the Today Show and NBC Nightly News via iTunes. Played a little catch up, and am glad to see the outbreaks appear to be relatively limited. Having now seen the concern through international eyes, though, I’ll be watching this story unravel more closely…even from here on the other side of the world.
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