Rich Karlgarrad writes an article for Forbes each month. This month its on Disruption, High and Low. The idea is someone is pulling your customers higher in value and some are pulling them lower in cost. After seeing China most imports are pulling cost lower.
Here's an interesting idea:
"Wal-mart and Dell both started as cheap disrupters, yet in middle age they leave little space for newer cheap disrupters from below. Here is what Dell and Wal-Mart have in common:
Headquarters in cheap locations
the best supply chains in the world
massive sourcing from CHINA.
Dell makes have of its computers in China, through Quant, a Taiwan-headquartered company. Wal-mart now consumes 10% of China's exports to the U.S. and 1% of China's GDP"