looking for a partner/mentor

Re: [spiers] looking for a partner/mentor

John, are there still countries that make
> business introductions this way?
>

This is where research comes in... I met a fellow in one of my classes, way back
in the 80's,
who had been given an opportunity to do "countertrade' for Boeing. The details
are foggy
this much removed, but essentially he was importing bicycle parts from
yugoslavia circa 1985
and Boeing found him and said "yugoslavia has no money, so we trade airplanes
for
yugoslavian merchandise. Bottled water, cars, boats, foodstuffs, wool, anything
and
everything" So in essence he just had to find buyers in usa for anything
yugoslavian, and
boeing would "pay" for whateverfor which he could find customers. Problem was,
he could
not find customers, hence my class.

Well, turns out Austrians had a lock on this skill matching up, again, sigh, at
the big biz level,
people with things the yugoslavians wanted (Boeing Jets, mercedes benz) with
things cash-
poor eastern bloc countries wanted to sell. Why the austrians? Who knows, but
usually the
things are a matter of a skill set developing thru competition. Barter trade,
countertrade... all
those exotic things the austrians did well.

Today one might consider working with German traders if buying from the Russia
if only
becuase Russia is rather wild west still, and the Germans do massive trade with
them,
suggesting an expertise.

Bottom line, once you identify a country as #1 thru NTDB research, then it is a
matter of
reading and researching everything you can to learn what the people thriviing in
biz with that
country do.

John

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