Chocolate Fortunes: The Battle for the Hearts, Minds, and Wallets of China's Consumers

Allen, a senior international executive with a 20-year track record of international branding, offers a fascinating look at the chocolate wars in China. Allen, himself a participant in bringing chocolate to this new frontier as an executive for Hershey and Nestlé, recounts the struggles of doing business in a rapidly changing market of almost limitless possibility. For five global chocolate titans (Ferrero Rocher, Cadbury, Hershey, Nestlé and Mars) entering this market, the stakes were extremely high and included a billion potential customers for generations to come. Allen details the challenges these organizations endured, including copyright infringement, dedicating lengthy chapters to each corporation, documenting their failures and successes and ultimately demonstrating that there's no single path to business success in this emerging world power. In addition to the many trials these firms encountered, Allen notes a new one that will soon emerge—competition from local Chinese companies. While local competitors are a low-level threat today, in the future, they will gain greater market share. Informative, cautionary and essential, this book is a must-read for executives currently doing business, or planning to, in this most volatile and critical market. (Oct.)