A recent Forbes article talks about the new Esprit, the clothing company. I did not know this, but the U.S. Esprit was going very badly, and eventually the independent Hong Kong based subsidary went public as Esprit Far east, then bought out the rest of Esprit. Then Michael Ying stepped aside and now Esprit is run by a Czech-born German, Heinz Krogner, has a Chinese-Canadian CFO based in HK, an American global retail manager, a Singaporean image director, and German wholesale manager. Krogner said "Five years ago, Hong kong was more Japanese, Europe was more dressed up,and America was sporty. But people have become more international. They travel, and their taste level has become more similar". At first I thought that was a good observation. But thinking about this more I would disagree. The more people travel, the more they would be expose to different styles. They may ended up select a style originated from a region that is not their base, but not necessary become homogenized. So if Esprit trys to use the same product line for the entire global market, maybe they will not make it after all.