The first thing I noticed upon my arrival in Portugal during August 2008, was its strong merchant aura. There is so much evidence and pride regarding their seafaring history in everything they do, from the statues in the old part of town to the way they address each other. As with many in Mainland Europe, Portuguese people display an underwhelming passion for titles. Senhor, Dina, Don, Commandatorre, etc.
Lisbon is a lovely city comprising the old and new parts of the city centre in an almost seamless manner. Everything in Portugal works; from the bus service, taxi and rail system to information services for stranded travellers around the city. Everything works! They love dry floury bread with highly salted pork cutlets and strong black coffee or the ubuquitos bottle of red wine so many Portuguese wine farms are famous for.
We went to Portugal to test if African Divas’ products would find a market there. As our products have a strong African flavour with rich, vibrant colours, we were curious to find out how the normally conservative people of Portugal would react to our products. Well, they suprised us with the amount of potential clients that came to our stand enquiring about the workmanship and quality of our product. Although many find our prices a bit high, we know that there is definitely a market in Portugal and consequently Europe for our goods! The Feira Internacionale de Artesanato 2008 was an eye opener regarding the potential to do business in Europe.
For us it was the wrong show. Till next time..... |
JD Consulting
