VietNamNet Bridge – Vietnamese tend to buy the latest and more expensive products, not to utilize the advanced technologies of the products, but to show them to friends

Smart TVs preferable because they are more expensive

Vietnamese in big cities have thrown away the old-generation convex TV or flat screen TVs, because smart TVs with LED screens are now in fashion.

More and more families have decided to use smart TVs, but they don’t understand what “smart TV” means. They have been using the smart TVs as other normal TVs, and what they do with the TVs every day is watching VTV programs, choosing TV channels, increasing or decreasing volume.

When asked if he usually watches 3D films with his newly bought TV, Hoang Van Hai in Cau Giay district said he does not enjoy 3D technology because of the glasses.

Van, a neighbor of Hai, also said that the 3D feature initially proved to be very attractive, but it has been no more used just half a month after the TV was bought.

The feature allowing to convert from 2D to 3D has also been “useless” to the majority of Vietnamese. The bad quality of images and the compulsory glasses have discouraged Vietnamese users.

Hai admitted that he has never used the “smart share” feature which allows sharing wireless data with computers, tablets or smart phones. Meanwhile, Van said the smart TV he bought has been mostly used by his son, who is an engineer of a software company and likes playing games.

Connecting the TV with Internet to watch films free of charge proves to be the most popularly used feature. Young people can access the big HD film stores which have been updated regularly instead of watching boring TV programs.

However, they rarely access the Internet through the smart TV to watch other programs, because it is more difficult to use the TV than laptops or desktop computers.

A smart TV with 3D, Internet and other smart features is priced at VND20 million at least. Experts said it would be more economical to buy a 2D TV with the Internet connection feature.

However, this is not the choice of Vietnamese, especially the well off families, which prefer fashionable and expensive products.

Big size cars the top priority

A lot of Vietnamese prefer wasting hundreds of millions of dong to buy big cars which do not fit their purposes.

One should not be surprised if a neighbor buys a big size SUV just to carry his son to school every day and drives to his office, instead of using a small energy-saving ar.

Some foreign automobile manufacturers once got exceedingly astonished when discovering that Vietnamese, who come from a poor country with the annual income per capita of less than $2,000 only, do not want to buy low cost products.

Toyota Vietnam, when launching Camry 2012 model into the market, also introduced the 2.0E version with lower price, hoping that the version would be selling well.

However, it realized after one year of selling the products that the more expensive 2.5G version was sold better.

Similarly, Ford Fiesta 1.4L, which Ford hoped to be the best seller among the three versions marketed, turned out to be unsalable, though the other versions were tens of millions of dong more expensive.  

Tran Thuy