It would be fascinating to be part of that team at Costco or IKEA planning to open a new store in a new country. On top of the challenges you can think of, there must be aspects of running the business that you take for granted in your home country and don’t realize will be a challenge in the new country.
> On top of the challenges you can think of, there must be aspects of running the business that you take for granted in your home country and don’t realize will be a challenge in the new country.
New Zealand has an educated, English speaking workforce, uses the English common law and actually has rule of law. They know how to do this. IKEA has stores in Vietnam, where all of those are much less true. They’re not going to learn much about international expansion they don’t know already. This is very different from a Canadian company opening up in the US, or a French one in Belgium. IKEA, and I presume Costco know how to do this already.
You hire people from the new market who do know those quirks. Or, you can be like McDonald's and most fast food/QSR companies, and simply license your name to "master franchisees" in those markets.
