I spent a good portion of my weekend checking out some of the best car dealerships São Paulo has to offer. This included brands such as: Aston Martin, Bentley, Mercedes-Benz, Ferrari, Maserati, Lamborghini and Porsche. Throughout my visits I encountered some very interesting experiences about Brazilian culture.
First I must say that these visits were great fun and I can’t be more lucky than to have the chance to spend my time doing things like this. On the other hand, Brazilian culture is very old-school. It’s quickly visible the amount of, we’ll say discretion they take when dealing with foreigners. The idea that someone come into their store who isn’t.. a) a friend or group-member or b) waving cash around like crazy.. is profoundly unheard of I think. The second one I get, I really do. As for the first one, really?
In one of the dealerships I entered, the folks there approached us very quickly, which is normal. But after saying I was there just to look around because we don’t have such nice cars in my home town, they were not too happy. Also, I don’t think my thick accent in Portuguese helped anything. From there on, my friend and I were followed from about 5-10 feet by a lady as she was talking on the phone. As for one of the other fellows in there with his kid who clearly knew the sales rep.. well, the rep was super warm and welcoming.
I’m not saying that knowing the person doesn’t help but man, this lady was like a shark! Not like a sales shark but instead she just wanted to make sure we weren’t going to steal anything. I was astonished at the attitude. I’d never buy from this place if I was actually looking. As for the other dealerships, a few, like the Lamborghini dealership were super nice! They were a little off-put by the idea of just looking at cars but they were still warm and receptive.
This got me to thinking about my overall experience here in Brazil. It’s very old-fashioned. From what I’ve seen, *Brazilians are kind of like corporate America. They value time-spent working on or in something versus value-created and of course, friends or people they know over people they have not met yet. This last one is very critical. It’s what I call the ‘Good ‘ol Boys club’. There’s a lot of that here.
*I want to point out that NOT ALL Brazilians are like this. It’s just a general impression.
Anyway, the cars were spectacular. Those that were welcoming were very welcoming. Later on Saturday, my friend and I went to a nice bar near my place and had a Cuban cigar with a nice glass of scotch. This is much more my vision of a good Saturday night than going and getting wasted at some club.
The final day of Startupfarm is tomorrow! It’s demo day and the top 6 teams from last Friday’s presentations are going to pitch. I wish them the best of luck and I can’t wait to see their pitches tomorrow night.
That is all though. Sorry it ended up being a bit of a longer post but I had some things to say I guess. I’ll be back tomorrow as well. See you then!
Connor
CONNOR McINTIRE 