Should business always adapt marketing tactics to adhere to local cultural norms?

If a business aspires to succeed in other cultures, isn’t the rule unequivocal that “you must adhere to that culture’s rules and norms?!”.

Here is an article about IKEA producing different ads to conform to Saudi Arabian standards.  In the ad produced for the Saudi market, they remove women in order to comply with the law banning depictions of women who don’t comply with the Islamic dress code.

What do you think of IKEA’s move?

Swedish version of ad

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saudi (airbrushed) version of ad

 

 

 

 

 

 

See the article and reader comments here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/01/ikea-saudi-arabia-catalogue_n_1928635.html