vlad.tribnet.com / Issue #147 / Business / Reading article...

Companies involved in the shipping industry recently learned about international networking at an exhibition that had a distinctly Russian flair.

The first international Primorye shipping exhibition Aug. 7-10, "Shipping, Ports, Ship Building, and Shelf Development in the Far East Region," didn't attract a large crowd. But exhibitions, where contracts are signed and fortunes made, are a new concept in Russia.

"Exhibitions like we are accustomed to in America don't happen here," said FESCO Intermodal Customer Service representative Christie Hopper. "People who come through the door are just kind of curious. In the states, I see the booth as a storefront. I don't see that here."

The Vladivostok variant brought Russian companies out to meet with international businesses in the industry. Without crowds to distract them, businesses were able to work on another concept recently added to the Russian business mentality ? networking.

"I'm quite surprised," said Karl Erik Erikkson, sales manager for the Norwegian marine paint company Jotun. "I think that we have made a lot of fruitful contacts for the future."

Erikkson wasn't talking about the businessman who dropped in for a visit. He was talking about the representatives from the booths next door.

Because the exhibition concept, particularly billed as the first gathering of international and domestic sectors of the shipping industry, it had a few problems. FESCO Advertising Manager Vyacheslav Sharapov was a little disappointed at first.

"My first impression was the lack of promotion, that the exhibition didn't achieve what we wanted," he said. But Sharapov later changed his mind. "We needed the exhibition. It's useful for everybody who's involved in shipping, marine business in general, for those who provide different materials for shipping."

Even though many representatives wondered where all the people were, no one minded too much. "We end up selling to each other because obviously, we're more clients to each other than to clients who come of the street," Hopper said.