How do brands travel? As firms expand globally, they must manage how their products and services are perceived across borders, peoples, and cultures. This can be thorny when what a firm offers has no immediate interpretation by an international audience, like selling ice cream to a nation that consumes little dairy. It can be even worse when a company's key products are likely to elicit negative reactions in their new market, like McDonald's hamburgers in India. Using the case of Hilton hotels' decision to enter the Chinese hospitality market, the case offers students a chance to work through the challenges and trade-offs when brands expand into markets culturally, politically, and economically different from what they are used to.
