Can Pinterest Be Found in Translation?

Pinterest is all about dreams and desires, but its visions are distinctly American. The company says 70 percent of its users, which ComScore estimates at 60 million, are in the U.S. Now Pinterest, which announced on May 16 that it had raised $200 million in funding, valuing the company at $5 billion, is trying to attract users in Asia and Europe with customized versions of its site, which lets people display collections of items they like.

On a trip to Japan late last year, Pinterest’s head of international business, Matt Crystal, spent a few hours in the Tokyo kitchen of a woman in her forties, inquiring about her cooking habits. When he asked where she kept recipes, she pulled out a drawer full of papers. He then began to show her how to store them on Pinterest. That way, he said, she could keep track of what she liked and find recipes from other cooks. It was one of several house calls Crystal made that week on one of a series of international research trips.