Export Strategies for Small American Firms

Uneven availability of data for the most recent years makes it necessary to conduct analysis based on the day before yesterday's data rather than on yesterday's. However, major facts and trends do not change dramatically in a few years. According to more recent estimates, the U.S. balance of merchandise trade is still eroding: From billion US$ −28 in 1981 to −36 in 1982, for example. See Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Survey of Current Business, vol. 63-No. 3 (March 1983), table 1–2; “US International Transactions,” p. 51.

Department of Commerce. Bureau of the Census. Statistical Abstract of the U.S., 1982–1983, Tables #876, p. 528 and #879, p. 529.

Ibid, Table #897, p. 535.

Department of Commerce. Bureau of the Census. 1977 Census of Manufacturers, vol. II, Industry Statistics, Part I. Table 1: “Statistics for all Manufacturing Establishments including Administrative Offices and Auxiliaries: 1977 and earlier years.”

The actual ratio is probably higher. The Census has raised its size inclusion criteria since 1967. See Census of Manufactures, 1977, vol. I, Subject Statistics, p. xii.

Small Business Administration. The State of Small Businesses: A Report to the President (Washington, D.C., GPO, 1983).

See Samuelson P. A. , Economics (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1976).

This position has been most recently argued by Terpstra V. in, “Critical Mass and International Marketing Strategy,” Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, vol. II, no. 3 (Summer 1983): 269–282.

From Department of Commerce, Highlights of U.S. Export and Import Trade: 1979 (December); and Bureau of the Census, Statistical Abstract of the U.S. 1982–1983.

From Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Census of Agriculture 1977, Part 5, summary and state data, “United States,” p. xii and p. 5.

Terpstra , op. cit.

See Stopford J. Dunning J. Haberich K. , “Size of firms and overseas activity of Directory firms: 1978 and 1974,” World Directory of Multinational Enterprise (New York: Facts on File, Inc., 1983), part 2, p. xxix.

Czinkota Michael R. Johnston W. J. , “Exporting: Does Sales Volume Make a Difference?” Journal of International Business Studies, Vol. 14, No. 1 (1983): 147–154.

Using an October 1983 exchange rate of approximately $1=8 FF. See Statistiques du Commerce Extérieur de la France, (Paris: Direction Générales des Douanes et Droits Indirects, 1982).

Répertoire illustré des firms exportatrices françaises—Produits alimentaires. (Paris: SOPEXA, Edition 1983).

A fuller version of the Rondele story is recounted in a case developed by Terpstra V. , International Marketing (New York: Dryden Press, 1983), pp. 174–175. Additional facts and figures about Ino Food and affiliates obtained from Mr. Matthy Welling, European Sales Manager.

See Daniels John D. Ogram Ernest W. Jr. Radebaugh Lee H. , “Case: Source Perrier,” in International Business: Environments and Operations (Reading, Mass., 1982), pp. 527–531.

That U.S. producers will eventually come up with an equivalent product does not conclude the story necessarily. The high and rising quality of California wines does not appear to have hurt Italian or French imports.

Carlson Jack Graham Hugh , “The Economic Importance of Exports to the United States,” in Center for Strategic and International Studies, ed., The Export Performance of the United States, (New York, NY: Praeger, 1981), pp. 39–146. The seemingly positive and growing balance in the U.S. export of services is largely a terminological illusion. See Dept. of Commerce, “Net export of goods and services, 1980–82,” Survey of Current Business (Washington, D.C.: Bureau of Economic Analysis, 1983), pp. 31–36.

See Statistical Abstract of the U.S., Table #879, op. cit.

Terpstra , International Marketing, op. cit.

Czinkota , op. cit.

Paranoia is rampant on this matter. Many a U.S. manufacturer suspects the Japanese of having perversely increased the degree of complexity of their national distribution system to keep American companies out. French exporters of food products tend to consider U.S. federal and state health regulations as so many cynical manifestations of U. S. protectionism. However, administrative harassment does exist. A few months before Christmas, 1982, the French government decreed that all non-EEC (i.e. Japanese) video equipment imported into France had to clear customs at Poitiers, as far as geographically posible from any major seaport.

See Lippert Albert , “How to Use Export Trading Companies to Penetrate Foreign Markets,” Business Symposium organized by Baruch College of the City University of New York, December 9, 1982.

See Carlson Jack Graham Hugh , op. cit., pp. 75–80.

This statement is based on GNP/capita figures. I realize that GNP/capita, an arithmetic average, is not, in principle, a substitute for distributions of actual disposable income. However, it is a close enough approximation for countries at similar levels of development which tend to have similar income distributions.

If only 0.5 percent of the Indian population were capable of supporting a Western middle-class lifestyle, they would still equal the population of Norway.