São Paulo – Starting on Monday (21), up to the 24th, Brazilian companies are once again going to be showing their products at the Big 5, the Middle East’s main building sector fair, in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates. "Our expectations for this edition of the fair are great. Our product has legal appeal in the market due to design,” said Silvio Fernandes, the export manager at Itagres, a porcellanato factory to exhibit at the fair for the sixth time.
The work developed over the years has made the region into one of the main markets for the brand, with Saudi Arabia the main destination and the Emirates and Algeria among the ten main buyers. "Exports grow each year,” said Fernandes. This year, the company should take seven new lines of products to show to Arab clients, among them a porcellanato whose colour, in "high definition", imitates marble.
MZ Artes, a maker of frames and decorative panels, is participating in the Big 5 for the first time, but the company has market experience, as it usually participates in the Index, the furniture and decoration fair that also takes place in Dubai. It is due to the good results at the Index that the company decided to go to the Big 5, according to trader Karina Botelho.
At the building sector fair, however, the idea is to sell to hotel projects, not to retailers, as is the case in the furniture fair. "I see great potential in hotel chains,” said Karina.
Another company that is already in the Arab market is Deca, of bathroom metals and ceramics. According to the company’s export manger, André Araújo, the brand’s objective is to be present and establish long-term relationships. "It is necessary to continue present, just going one year and not the next does not work,” he said.
In his evaluation, it is necessary to invest for return over a long period, especially at a time in which the market is down due to the debt crisis in European nations. Araújo should share the stand with the distributor Deca has in the Emirates and hopes to make good contacts.
Enthusiastic, Maurício Adriano Trupel, the owner of Tropical Rocks, should exhibit at the fair for the first time. He knows the market, however, as he has already visited the fair. The company sells marble and granite, but only finished products, no blocks and plates. “I have always seen the Middle East as a very good market,” he explained.
Trupel aims to do business directly with construction companies and hopes to establish at least one partnership due to the fair. He has know-how for such, as his company works almost exclusively with the foreign market.
Marlucia Martire, from ALM Brazil trading company, also already knows the Middle East, but is going to exhibit at Big 5 for the first time and expectations are great. "There is still great potential in the building sector in the region,” she said.
She is going to show products of two companies. They are typically Brazilian ornamental stones, like amethysts, citrene, pink and blue quartz, as well as marble and granite. The former are decorations. When cut in half, they show crystals in exuberant forms and bright colours.
Marlucia says she was invited to participate in a trade mission to Africa at the same time as the Big 5, but she preferred the fair.
The Brazilian pavilion is organized by the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce and the Brazilian Export and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex). Other companies are going to exhibit, like Metalúrgica Fênix, of metal structures, and Astra, a maker of bathroom products.
Brazilian businessmen are also going to participate in a breakfast with Arab importers, and a delegation coordinated by the Federation of Industries of the State of Santa Catarina (Fiesc), with the support of the Arab Brazilian Chamber, should visit the fair.
*Translated by Mark Ament
