VietNamNet Bridge – Vietnamese manufacturers and suppliers have been trying every possible way to approach to the US biggest retail chain in an effort to boost exports to the market.

Dao Tran Nhan, minister resident of the Vietnamese Commercial Affairs Division in the US, said in 2014, Vietnam would carry out all necessary things to approach the US leading retailer after it successfully persuaded the second biggest retailer to sign a cooperation agreement.

“We plan to approach the US’ biggest retailer – Walmart – in 2014 to invite it to buy goods from Vietnamese enterprises,” Nhan said in an interview given to local press.

The Vietnamese Commercial Affairs Division in San Francisco has drawn up a plan to invite Vice President of Walmart to Vietnam, where he would have the meetings with the representatives from ministries and local authorities.

“We plan to come to Walmart’s headquarter to meet its sale director and invite him to the meeting in Vietnam,” he said.

In 2013, the Vietnamese commercial affairs division in the US successfully invited Kroger to Vietnam, organizing a meeting between Kroger and the representatives of 128 Vietnamese enterprises in HCM City. Some of them have signed memorandum of understanding on goods supply with the retailer.

Currently, Vietnamese enterprises mostly export raw products to the US which would be processed for sale at supermarkets. Meanwhile, as Kroger said, if Vietnamese products can meet the requirements, they would buy them and put on shelves.

Nhan thinks that not only the Vietnamese well-known products such as seafood, garments, wooden furniture or cashew nuts, but the products for interior decoration, coffee… can also enter the US supermarkets.

In fact, Walmart in the UK has been importing a lot of Vietnamese products, but Walmart in the US has not.

However, Nhan has warned that it would be not easy for Vietnamese to bring goods to the US supermarket chain. In general, the US big companies only cooperate with big partners and place big orders for millions of products.

Some Vietnamese businessmen who have been selling products to the US well- known supermarket chains like Target or Costco through different ways, also said it is still early to say if Vietnamese can penetrate the US supermarkets and how big the benefits they can get from this.

Diep Thanh Kiet, Deputy Chair of the Vietnam Leather and Footwear Association, has affirmed that to date, no Vietnamese enterprise in the garment or footwear industries can export their products to the US supermarket chains under their names. The exports either bear the brands of the manufacturers or supermarkets’ private names.

The deputy director of a garment company said his company once provided goods to Walmart through an intermediate party, but it later had to give up, because Walmart set very low prices. Meanwhile, the products could not bear the labels with the name of the company.

“I don’t think Vietnamese enterprises can stick their names on the products when providing goods to Walmart, partially because of the Vietnamese weak trademark recognition and partially because of the Walmart’s sale policy,” he said.

Nguyen Van Le, Deputy General Director of Dong Hung Industry JSC, which specializes in exporting footwear products, thinks that it would be very difficult for Vietnamese producers to offer the best prices to satisfy Walmart once they cannot control the material sources and prices.

NCDT