As this is a part of my assignment I interviewed one of my friends and uncle on

skype who resides in New York, United States of America.

They seemed to be quite friendly, approachable to give the interview.
I asked them how firstly if they have ever come to India & has they felt that their
culture which is Western is different or similar from the culture we have here in
India. I personally aware of how the Western Culture is which is quite different from
the Indian Culture, they are more into not having the savings culture, they want to
travel more, they do not support their children beyond the age of 18or 20 and they
also want to live life with a lot of comfort level, luxury & leisure.
Whereas Indians are more savings oriented, family oriented, today a little into
travelling but earlier they were not.
When I asked them about their working culture their answers were quite different
from as what we have here India.
They said that they dont work on Saturday and Sunday they simply relax they to
like spend time with their family or they do party or they may go for weekend tripe.
on the other hand, here in India we work on Saturday most of people work 12 hours
in a day or more and even here in India we have lots of people who also work on
Sunday all 7 day of week so we are quite different from them.
When I asked them about (ii) fast food restaurants, they told me the Americans
have the culture to eat a lot of junk food, there are people who cannot do without
Coke every day, its like water for them, but it is also an extreme thing as some of
them have a lot of allergies to nuts or soy or some kind of product, so when they
have from outside they do not know how the oil is, so they may get some problem,
there is also a small population that is health conscious but the larger population is
a lot into unhealthy eating habits like Burgers, Pizzas. Indians on the other hand
have the culture of eating homemade food, have the regular dal chawal, roti sabji
etc. we prefer to eat at home on weekdays and on weekends eat outside, we do
have some different values that we hold today with the Mc Donalds, Pizza Huts,
Burger King outlets all over the country. So here is the difference in the cultural
habits.
they told me that out there about (iii) shampoos they all are quite finicky, they love
good smelling products, they have a wide variety available. They also have the
clearance products-available which Indians don't really have.
They spend a lot on cosmetics, on makeup, on skincare products & slowly the
Indians are also doing the same, we are getting more Westernized with the passing
time & their culture is influencing ours in my opinion.

Lastly when I asked them about (iv) sneakers in their culture, they answer about
this was quite long or more impactful. My friend answered me with question he
asked me that have you ever given any thought to the ever present footwear
sneakers and their evolution? Whether you call them sneakers or tennis shoes or
basketball shoes they are a global obsession worn by billions and found in every
corner of the Earth & they is clearly obsessed with them too. they said that there is
a rise of 'sneaker culture' in the United States and the people out there are sneaker
heads! Also, the birth of sneaker head culture in the United States came in the
1980s and can be attributed to two major sources: basketball, specifically the
emergence of Michael Jordan and his eponymous Air Jordan line of shoes released in
1985, and the growth of hip hop music. She had a lot to share on this but I as well
knew about this as I feel the youth in India as well are sneaker heads today, and we
can even distinguish between the real & the fake ones.
Also I would like to add that overall I spoke to them about other things as well
apart from the assignment & came to this conclusion thatIn India lower brand-consciousness, much higher price sensitivity and much more
likely to do a lot of DIY repair and maintenance and keep things working with a lot of
patched-up repair. Thats the traditional middle class. There's also an emerging
globalized middle class that acts like Western consumers. The "inexperienced
buying" perception is highly mistaken. Mostly I'd say they are more sophisticated,
not less, with a keen eye for real value, strong bullshit detectors and far more savvy
than you'd think even around products/services that are new to the country. What
you may see as "inexperienced" is actually just "difference" and the fact that unlike
Americans, they haven't been domesticated and told how to think by Mad Men.
They actually tend to think for themselves, which American consumers haven't
done on a large scale since 1930 or so. This tendency is reinforced by the high
degree of cultural fragmentation and the relatively low ability of national pop
culture (Bollywood and cricket) to influence the market.
The difference also is in two cultural attitudes. First, it's a culture where
consumption is not about status or ostentation outside of a few narrow categories
like silk saris, cars, jewelry, houses and so forth. Americans by contrast turn every
purchase into a status signal. So American marketers trying to position and
differentiate based on social status can be in for a surprise when even rich people
act like poor people in many purchase categories. The second behavior is related: a
very high tolerance for poor quality. It's known as the "chalta hai" ("it will do")
attitude, and extends beyond buying to basically everything. There is a very poor
culture of quality consciousness (except in a few areas like food, where people will
yell for sub-par food). As a result, the market is a huge flood of third rate stuff.
There is a corresponding unwillingness to pay for high quality. This is actually quite
a rational response to the environment, and has a long history. This is observed in
the cultures.

So we can say that our consumption behaviors are quite similar, yet quite different,
its a like a paradox and the best we can do is imbibe good traits from each other.