ontrol over what products and information is available to the children. For example, a parent may decide to restrict the product catalog to the lower cost products and products that offer more of an educational experience. The other advantage is that this strategy will address payment issues. A further advantage coming from allowing the children to do their own shopping on the Internet is providing a fun experience to the child.The American market should be the starting point for the firm’s e-commerce efforts because of complexity of infrastructure in terms of logistics, marketing, legal issues, currency and many other factors. The firm should use the American market as a test bed and because of the three month deadline Lego will have trouble reaching into all the markets. After some E-Commerce experience has been gained the firm can begin to move the American website into each of the other 3 markets. Some modifications such as currency and language issues will require the site to be tailored to the different markets. The general feeling is that the E-Commerce site will result in an integrated market; however, the website must address issues related to particular cultures. Additional technical advantages are gained from splitting the sites geographically such as performance and load balancing issues.An important consideration relates to the use of the Internet in traditional areas of business such as procurement and distribution. These areas could be handled in a single country, locally, or a host of other combinations. Shipping and distribution probably is best handled locally. The process of integrating the supply chain into an E-Commerce and traditional business can be technologically complex and probably at this time will provide further complications. Pricing issues must address the consumers’ additional information in terms of price and quality that the Internet provides. The pricing information available t...
