Same deal in India for various US fast food chains like McDonalds and Pizza Hut. They aren’t luxury restaurants per se, but definitely considered fancier and more exotic than the average.
Kind of how we’d treat a popular upscale and creative new Asian restaurant in the neighborhood: a place to go for something rather chic and out of the ordinary, worth dressing up a bit for. You definitely wouldn’t go into an Indian Pizza Hut in your grubby old gardening clothes, for instance.
I’ve heard that BMWs are considered just ordinary cars in South Africa, while they’re considered luxury enthusiast-oriented vehicles in North America.
Isn’t Ford considered a slightly more upmarket brand in the UK compared to its home turf in the United States? I’ve also seen references on Top Gear and in British car magazines that Honda is the preferred auto brand among the elderly, much like Buick in the United States.
In France, most restaurants will do a carafe of house wine for very little money - often not much more than a bottle of fizzy water. Sometimes I get the impression the wine might be watered down a bit, but it’s usually palatable.
Not really. Fords have a reputation for being “rep mobiles” (i.e. cars driven by travelling salesmen - the Ford Mondeo is the archetype of this), dull-but-reliable family hatchbacks (Ford Focus) or sensible choice for a teenager’s first car (Ford Fiesta).
Speaking of Buick, at least a few years ago, it was a trendy, prestigous vehicle in China.
Also, in Europe there are Mercedes trucks – I see them all the time, especially in Germany. That’s another thing that doesn’t get exported to the U.S.
Although not many houses have air-conditioning in the UK, many public buildings, including shops and offices have it, together with more modern trains and buses.
I don’t believe this is accurate. I would consider BMW a luxury car in South Africa, although I believe they are more common than Mercedes or Audi.
No, it’s not generally the case in most of Europe that restaurant wine is the same price as retail wine, I’m sorry to report, even in France.
I did notice on a recent trip to the US (New England) that wine in restaurants, even average ones, seemed stupidly expensive. But the poor £-$ exchange rate might have added to the sticker shock. Didn’t stop me buying it, however 
On a tangential note, Playboy (using the trademark Playboy rabbit logo) is a leather goods/clothing brand in China. Which version is the luxury brand is left as an exercise to the reader.
BMW has historically had a fairly close relationship with South Africa, and IIRC have some significant production facilities there. so you are correct that BMWs might make up a bigger percentage of cars on the road than other brands. I guess the key to note is that like Mercedes, BMW’s model range goes far below what the cheapest model would be in the US, which have at least 6 cylinder engines. Most of their sales in South Africa and the rest of the world will be 4 cyl diesel models.
As far as ordinary vs luxury, I think you need to remember that most of the rest of the world, including Europe have lower rates of car ownership than the US, and car ownership is discouraged by the government through taxes on fuel, value added taxes on cars, and generally more investment in public transit and more dense urban planning. One result is that the “barrier to entry” of owning a car is generally higher, and people either own a nicer car (which generally will cost more to the end consumer than they do in America), or they won’t bother and just take the train or bus. An exact comparison would be quite complex and will probably bore you. Suffice to say that All car companies, if they want to operate with any volume in a foreign market, generally have very different product lineups for that market. As mentioned here and in other threads, Ford Europe has an entirely different car lineup than Ford USA, there was a time after the demise of the Ford GT supercar where they didn’t have a single car model in common (this will change once the Ford Fiesta is released in the US). This is the same for Japanese car companies - their popular Japanese models, like the Honda Fit, are largely poor sellers in the US if they are sold at all, and most of their volume come from exclusively US models not sold elsewhere.
It still is. More correctly, Buick is still in China what Buick was in the America of the 1960s, before GM allowed the brand to wither on the vine and Lexus to take its place. Currently Buick sells more cars in China than the US, and is wildly popular and massively profitable. Their model lineups are largely different and almost always European or Australian - Buick China has a Rear wheel drive large luxury competitor to the Mercedes E-Class and BMW 5 series, for example, built from a Holden knockdown kit from Australia. In the older generation there is still some residual sentiment from World War II that the Americans are the “good guys” and on “our” side while the Japanese are viewed with some suspicion.
Yet another reason to restrict my travels to the Caribbean.
I just don’t understand how it could be true. After all, restaurant owners are in it for the money.
In restaurants that intentionally keep wine at retail, I’ve been told, basically, that the restaurateur wants people to enjoy their food maximally. Many, myself included, believe that wine can play a role.
I remember that when the first KFC in Bangladesh was still pretty new, there were people showing up in limousines and fancy dresses. It is in the richer part of town (so such things weren’t entirely out of place), but the image was rather striking.
Also amusing is that one of the copycats is “California Fried Chicken”, because certainly California must be more upscale than Kentucky, right?
Weird restaurant. I have never in my 36 years of life in the UK encountered an establishment where Budweiser was expensive.
And it’s not an import, either. Budweiser, along with most other beers around the world, has local brewers:
http://company.monster.co.uk/anheuseruk/
The UK market is managed by Anheuser-Busch Europe Ltd; a fully autonomous business unit within Anheuser-Busch International. Head office functions are based at Thames Link House, Richmond and brewing is carried out by Anheuser-Busch brewmasters at the Budweiser Stag Brewery in Mortlake.
And, just to add to that - Anheuser-Busch is currently Belgian owned, not American, but is responsible for 50% of all US beer sales.
We eat in different restaurants then. Actually, maybe only one different - I have not noticed it elsewhere, not that I look for it - it just stood out. It was an Indian restaurant.
People on this board are too literal! I am sure it is regarded as being an American beer, no matter where it is brewed. Maybe one day it will be viewed otherwise, just as many Brits regard Fords and Vauxhalls as British cars, even though they may well be made in the Spanish operations of an American parent company.
New York magazine just ran an article on the clothing brand Uniqlo:
They most assuredly do not! 
Despite my current “location”, I am English, and I say “They most assuredly do” (or did - they could have changed since I left).
Heck, this happens in the United States. I can drive by Red Lobster and all of the people from the Detroit-side of the road are dressed up to eat in a “fancy” restaurant, whereas to me it’s really only worthy of ordinary street clothes (which in summer can be shorts and T-shirt).