Selling the American Way: The Singer Sales System in Japan, 1900-1938

Citation:

Gordon, Andrew. “Selling the American Way: The Singer Sales System in Japan, 1900-1938.” Business History Review 82, no. 4 (2009).

Abstract:

From 1900 through the 1920s, Singer put in place its proven selling system in Japan, despite making remarkably little adjustment to local conditions, and with a fair degree of success. But the company was hurt in the long run, with a turning point in the early- to mid-1930s, by its refusal to adapt - as its local competitors did - to the expectations of employees and the limited means of potential customers. Singer's dramatic rise and fall in Japan reveals ways in which practices of global capitalism are simultaneously transformed and transformative as they take root in particular locales.

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Last updated on 06/13/2017