Frequently asked questions for CountryManager

CountryManager is an international marketing simulation in which students manage Allsmile, a toothpaste brand from the consumer-products company Allstar Brands. They lead the brand’s entry and expansion into either Latin America or Asia.

Students develop a regional strategy by evaluating countries, entering markets, adapting the marketing mix, and managing growth over time.

CountryManager is designed primarily for courses in:

• International Marketing
• International Business
• Global Marketing Strategy
• Marketing Management courses with a strong international component

The simulation is especially useful when instructors want students to apply market-entry, segmentation, positioning, standardization, and adaptation concepts in an integrated setting.

CountryManager develops skills in:

• Market entry and expansion: comparing opportunities and sequencing entry across countries
• Segmentation and positioning: matching product benefits to consumer needs
• International marketing mix: coordinating product, price, promotion, and distribution
• Standardization versus adaptation: deciding what can be shared regionally and what must be localized
• Financial analysis: forecasting sales, contribution, and return on investment
• Cross-cultural decision-making: responding to different economic, retail, consumer, and cultural environments

Instructors can select one of two regional scenarios:

• Latin America: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru, with optional Venezuela
• Asia: China, India, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, and Thailand

The regions differ in economic conditions, consumer preferences, distribution systems, costs, competition, and market potential.

Students must decide whether to use similar products and marketing programs across the region or customize them for individual countries.

Differences in consumer needs, language, culture, distribution, competition, and costs make this a recurring strategic tradeoff rather than a one-time decision.

CountryManager includes up to 10 decision periods, with each period representing one simulated year. The recommended experience is 6–10 periods.

The number of periods, countries available, plant timing, and assignment load can be adjusted to fit the course schedule and desired complexity.

The recommended team size is 3–4 students; for online courses, 2–3 students is recommended. One student serves as team leader and finalizes decisions and advances the simulation.

CountryManager uses benchmark competition, so each team faces the same simulated market environment. This allows straightforward comparison while keeping one team’s decisions from changing another team’s market.

Instructors can select the region, control which countries become available and when, delay or remove the plant decision, enable analysis tools, set replay rules, choose the number of periods, and select assignments.

The Latin America scenario also includes optional sustainability and Venezuela market-entry decisions.

Available resources include a case quiz, concepts quiz, participant or peer evaluations, and assignments such as:

• Market Attractiveness and Consumer Preferences
• Market Forecast and Plant Location
• Regional Marketing Plan
• Sales Force Allocation and Distribution Channels
• Pricing and Margins
• Currency Exchange and Package Design
• Break-even Analysis and Product Advertising
• Management Audit and Final Presentation

Students act as country managers responsible for building a regional toothpaste business. They:

• Evaluate country attractiveness and select markets to enter
• Choose SKUs and product benefits for each market
• Set prices and retailer allowances
• Select distribution channels and allocate sales force
• Develop advertising campaigns and promotional spending
• Choose production sources and decide where to locate a regional plant
• Monitor competitors, exchange rates, profitability, and brand equity

Students decide whether and when to enter additional countries and then manage each active market through decisions in:

• Market entry
• SKUs and pricing
• Distribution channels
• Advertising and promotion
• Sales-force allocation
• Production sourcing, plant location, and plant capacity
• Sustainability options when enabled in the Latin America scenario

Students have access to information about each country’s economy, consumers, competition, retail structure, costs, and market size. They can compare market attractiveness and estimate demand before committing resources.

Optional tools may include a positioning map, conjoint analysis, test markets, and forecasting models, depending on instructor settings.

Yes. The default recommendation is two individual practice periods followed by team play. The simulation is then restarted, erasing the practice decisions and results.

This gives students a low-risk opportunity to understand the interface and the relationship between decisions and outcomes.

Yes. CountryManager includes decision-analysis tools for examining spending, forecasting SKU demand, and estimating contribution. Instructors may also enable replays, allowing students to return to the previous period and experiment with a different decision set.

Replay availability can be limited by period or by the total number allowed.

CountryManager reports both financial results and brand-building outcomes. Instructors and students can review sales, market share, gross margin, marketing spending, net contribution, and return on investment.

The Brand Equity Index also evaluates benefit positioning, pricing, awareness, distribution, and the balance between regional standardization and local adaptation.

The Brand Equity Index, or BEI, gives students feedback on the quality and consistency of their marketing decisions beyond immediate financial results.

It helps teams see whether their brands are well positioned, appropriately priced, sufficiently supported, widely available, and managed coherently across markets.

The instructor acts as a coach and consultant, helping teams connect international marketing concepts to their results. The instructor can use benchmarking, contribution, brand-equity, and decision reports to identify problems and ask students to explain their reasoning.

The goal is to guide analysis without revealing the underlying model or prescribing a single “correct” strategy.

Interpretive manages the simulation logistics and answers student technical questions. Each instructor is partnered with a customer relationship manager and receives faculty resources including presentations, demonstrations, assignments, teaching notes, and performance-comparison tools.

Instructors choose the course settings and schedule; Interpretive’s support team handles the administrative setup.