Companies take notice of Vietnamese community

At Makro, a wholesale retail outlet popular with restaurant and small business owners, Vietnamese promotional materials and employees recruited for their Vietnamese-language skills are part of an effort from the company to tap into a market that has grown steadily in the past two decades. The trend has extended recently to telecommunications companies, insurance providers, car dealers and other wholesalers who work with Vietnamese večerkas, or convenience stores, and restaurant owners, benefiting both the buyers and the sellers.

"Some wine distributors have started printing their material and order forms in Vietnamese," said Thi Minh Trang Nguyen, who owns PhuSaBoLily Večerka on Jungmannova street. "I think it helps the Vietnamese store owners, because they often only speak basic Czech, and, this way, it's easier for them to do business."

Vietnamese workers began immigrating during communism when they were invited by the government as guest workers. Since 1991, when the census showed 421 Vietnamese residents, the community has grown to more than 60,000, according to a 2008 estimate from the Czech Statistical Office, more than three times the number from the 2001 census, which counted 17,462. While many Vietnamese have come to the Czech Republic through employment agencies to fill factories, a growing number are establishing themselves as small to midsize business owners who deal directly with other Czech companies. As a result, the community's purchasing power has grown, said Marcel Winter, head of the Czech-Vietnamese Society, who has seen a growing number of companies outside basic wholesalers begin to target the market.

"I was at a conference in Hradec Králové and was approached by producers of chocolate bars, cash register manufacturers and even producers of smoked meat," he said. "Companies are beginning to realize there's this community that's not being addressed."

Growing interest

Winter has helped advise companies who are looking for a way to reach out to the market, and the society has even cooperated with national health insurer VZP for the past four years. Three years ago, 7 percent of Vietnamese in the Czech Republic were insured; today, the number stands at 71 percent, he said.

Organizations like the Czech-Vietnamese Society and the Association of Vietnamese Businesses in the Czech Republic have taken note of the growing interest from companies, which has intensified in the "past year or so" according to Thai Ngoc Nguyen, deputy president of the association and a Czech resident for 20 years. Even small efforts like translated promotions and advertising has granted those companies an advantage over competitors, he added.

"In the case of Makro, they're answering to the phenomenon of small Vietnamese entrepreneurs who are opening večerkas," he said. "They're becoming substantial and loyal customers for places like Makro."

In the past year, Makro has hired the services of translators and marketing consultants to grow their Vietnamese client base, said spokeswoman Markéta Světlíková, and even shifted their product lines in response to specific demands from the community.

"We've definitely recruited Vietnamese employees," she said. "We know some Vietnamese business owners can't speak top-level Czech, and, when it comes to business transactions, it's important to understand every single detail. We consider it helpful for both sides."

Vodafone, one of the top three telecommunications companies in the Czech Republic, approached the association directly at the beginning of 2009 to offer special rates for members who call Vietnam, one of the most popular countries long-distance calls among their customers, said spokesman Lukáš Kropík.

"We did special research, and, based on that, we chose the largest minority customer groups in the Czech Republic," he said, which also include Belarusian, Russian, Chinese and Ukrainian. "Vietnamese customers have been very interested in the entire portfolio of services and how they can use them to keep expenditures under control."

As younger generations of Vietnamese graduate and enter the Czech work force, the community's demand for goods has shifted as well, attracting the attention of producers of more high end goods. Car dealers like Mercedes and BMW have begun to advertise in Vietnamese magazines published in the Czech Republic, which indicates the purchasing power of the community has grown recently, Winter said.

"There are residents who have lived here for 10, 20, 30 years, and they have 10,000 children finishing high school and university," he said.

Nguyen said she's noticed the shift in the past few years, concurrent with the growing number of Vietnamese entrepreneurs who have been successful in their businesses, even during an economic downturn that has hobbled other small business owners.

"There's a lot of prosperity in this market," she said. "The marketing is a good idea, because there are a lot of Vietnamese-owned stores now, and there's a lot of money in that business."

Claire Compton can be reached at
ccompton@praguepost.com