英语翻译
1.Western companies had problems selling refrigerators in Japan until they changed the design to make them quieter
Japanese homes were small and sometimes walls were made of paper.It was important for the refrigerators to be quiet.
2.In Saudi Arabia,newspaper adverts for an airline showed an attractive hostess serving champagne to happy passengers.A lot of passengers cancelled their flight reservations.
Unveiled women don’t mix with men in Saudi Arabia and alcohol is illegal.
3.A soap powder advertisement had a picture of dirty clothes on the left,a box of soap in the middle and clean clothes on the right.The soap didn’t sell well in the Middle East.
The advertisers forgot that in that part of the world,people usually read from right to left.
4.A company had problems when it tried to introduce instant coffee to the French market.
Making ‘real’ coffee was an important part of the French way of life.Instant coffee was too casual.
5.Several European and American firms couldn’t sell their products in Dubai when they ran their advertising campaign in Arabic.
90% of the population came from Pakistan,India,and Iran and elsewhere,so Arabic was the wrong language
6.An airline company called itself Emu,after the Australian bird.But Australians didn’t want to use the airline.
The Emu can’t fly.
7.A TV commercial for a cleaning product showed a little girl cleaning up the mess her brother made.The commercial caused problems in Canada.
People thought the commercial was too sexist and reinforced old male-female stereotypes.
8.A toothpaste manufacturer couldn’t sell its product in parts of South East Asia.
The people in this area didn’t want white teeth.They thought darkly stained teeth were beautiful and they tried to blacken them.
9.An American golf ball manufacturer launched its products in Japan packed in boxes of four.It had to change the pack size.
In Japanese the word for ‘four’ sounds like the word for ‘death’.Things don’t sell goods packed in fours.
10.Ladies’ electric shavers sold well throughout Europe,but not in Italy.
It seems Italian men prefer ladies’ legs unshaven.