From Italy to Paraguay: how to prepare a serious entry

Companies that arrive in Paraguay and get nowhere often have one thing in common: they started at stage four. They looked for a partner, or a client, or a property, before defining what exactly they were looking for and why in this country.

The sequence below is not a theoretical model. It is the order in which things work least badly.

1. Define the objective, not the destination

The first useful question is not «how do I enter Paraguay» but «what has to change in my company». Selling an existing product in a new market, finding a production base at different costs, diversifying supply, serving Brazil from a different position: these are four different projects, with different partners, timelines and risks.

Anyone who does not choose at this stage will choose by accident later.

2. Test the hypothesis from a distance

A great deal can be done before boarding a plane: read the official sources on how the sector is framed, identify trade associations and their members, understand who already operates in the niche, what import channels exist and on what margins.

The aim of this stage is not to confirm the hypothesis. It is to find out quickly, and cheaply, if it does not hold.

3. Build a list of real counterparts

Not a list of names, but a qualified list: who they are, what they do, who decides, who knows them. This is where local knowledge makes a measurable difference, because the difference between a contact and a counterpart is exactly the qualification work in between.

4. The first mission

Three to five days in Asunción, with an agenda built beforehand rather than improvised on arrival. Meetings, not courtesy calls. And at least one trip outside the capital, because a significant part of productive activity is not in the city.

The measure of success for a first mission is not signing something. It is coming home with an accurate understanding of what is possible, what is not, and who is worth continuing with.

5. Formal verification

Only now does the technical work begin, and it should not begin earlier: corporate form, applicable regime, compliance, customs matters, contracts, entry and residence questions for staff.

This stage belongs entirely to professionals licensed in Paraguay, each within their own field. No generalist consultant, no intermediary and no article can substitute for them, and choosing those professionals is itself part of the project.

6. The first transaction, small

A modest order, a pilot project, an agreement limited in time. It exists to test in the field what no analysis shows: real lead times, quality of communication, handling of the unexpected, payment behaviour.

Anyone who goes straight from a letter of intent to structural investment is buying information at the highest possible price.

The role that remains

Along this path I work on three stages: defining the objective, building the list of real counterparts, and organising missions on the ground. On stage five I do not — I refer it, and accompany you, to licensed professionals.

It is a distinction worth asking of anyone offering assistance for Paraguay: which stages they cover and, above all, which they state they do not.