"No matter what you may be selling, your business in China should be enormous, if the Chinese who should buy your goods would only do so." But will they? Carl Crow opened the first western advertising agency in Shanghai and ran it for twenty-five years, promoting everything from American lipsticks and moisturizers to French brandy and pharmaceuticals, and nothing was straightforward. In this highly readable account of his work in Shanghai, illustrated with delightful line drawings, Crow uses anecdotes and examples to illustrate the particular challenges of doing business in China.

On the original edition . . ."Superlatively entertaining." New York Times Book Review"No one who wants to do business in China can safely neglect it." The Times (London)"A feast of human nature for almost any reader." Carl Van Doren, Boston Herald"One of the most convincing and lifelike descriptions of Chinese life we have ever had." Dorothy Canfield, Book of the Month Club News

Four Hundred Million Customers (1937) is a collection of humorous essays and piquant anecdotes underpinned by well-informed insight and highlighted by witty drawings by G. Sapojnikoff. The book has lost none of its still perceptive insights into China, which is now more than triple "four hundred million."

"No matter what you may be selling, your business in China should be enormous, if the Chinese who should buy your goods would only do so." But will they?. "400 Million Customers" is essential reading for all foreigners seeking to do business in the booming economies of Asia, and all analysts of globalization and cultural difference. Carl Crow opened the first western advertising agency in Shanghai and ran it for twenty-five years, promoting everything from American lipsticks and moisturizers to French brandy and pharmaceuticals, and nothing was straightforward. In this highly readable account of his work in Shanghai, illustrated with delightful line drawings, Crow uses anecdotes and examples to illustrate the particular challenges of doing business in China. In Crow's time, no foreigners managed to dominate the Chinese market, and today -- when the population of China has trebled - the question remains whether the country is a potential mass market for the west, or a golden illusion. Crow's book remains as apt now as when it was written in 1937, and leading business schools recommend it as one of the best accounts of Chinese business culture.