As some of you know, my company has an office in Nanning, but until today I didn't have a chance to visit. Well, now I'm here, and I want to tell you about it in this thread. (There are not many threads on 3rd tier cities without tourist attractions here, so my insights can be extrapolated to other cities that receive few foreign visitors.)

Flying in, what initially struck me was how green the landscape is... just like nice parts of Thailand.

Then, when I exited baggage claim, my second impression was -- man, there are a lot of people here. Since I live in one of the most populous cities in the world, this observation might surprise you, but I guess my point is that Shanghai has pretty good infrastructure for dealing with millions of people living on top of each other, whereas this place does not.

Third impression: construction everywhere and in excess. Again, I've lived through the construction booms in Nanjing, Shanghai, and Beijing -- the latter two arguably being the largest in the history of the world. But, these guys are basically rebuilding their entire city in 100 acre plots.

Fourth, the presence of western brands here is scant in comparison with tier 1 and tier 2 China. I was already prepared for this, but seeing it person has really resonated with me. Basically, 6 million people, many of which have lots of money, and they don't have access to the same LV bags that the rest of China covets. In other words, the big brands spend 90% of their marketing budgets beating each other up in Beijing and Shanghai, while completely ignoring this virgin soil.

That's all for now. I'll try to get out and take some pictures tonight.