Trade with Greece
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packaging materials, as a measure of last resort.
Indeed, in just a few hours (!) trucks from the
neighbouring country were unloading crates full of
packaging materials at the parent company’s
premises. The great surprise came when the rel-
evant invoices were delivered to the parent com-
pany’s accounting department. The price the sub-
sidiary asked for this service was half of the price
charged by the Northern Greece-based Greek
supplier! The manufacturer’s people were
astounded to find that this meant substantial cost
savings. And, naturally, they were tempted to con-
template the prospects of their supplier and their
collaboration with it after the lifting of the capital
controls — which did not seem promising.”
The story however did not end there, as things
became even worse for the Greek supplier — a
middle-sized Greek enterprise. According to the
narrative “the large Greek company decided that
it was no use bothering its subsidiary for as long
as the capital controls would stay in effect, by ask-
ing every now and then for new packaging mate-
rials. And what did it do? Urged by its subsidiary,
it directly contacted the subsidiary’s supplier, also
based in this neighbouring country. During the
talks for closing the deal, when the foreign suppli-
er heard the quantities involved, reduced the
price to 1/4 of the price charged by its Greek com-
petitor! Since then, all orders are placed in the
neighbouring country, the merchandise is deliv-
ered at the company’s premises in a few hours,
and all that at 1/4 of the price. Tell me, please,
which are the prospects of the Greek supplier
after this?” the banker asked, bringing the con-
versation to an end.
It has been many months since then, and we
don’t know how the supplier did in the end; only
one thing is for certain: hundreds, if not thou-
