It was a crush, says Daniel Saramaga who started flying 32 years ago first with an ultralight, then with a passenger plane and when he got on a helicopter he fell in love with it.

So much so that the tender for the heliport of the Buenos Aires racetrack was presented and won to offer tourism the possibility of seeing the city from above. He invested a million dollars and created a fueling center, hangar services and helicopters to both fight the freeze and monitor oil or gas pipelines.

Saramaga is one of those who pushes every detail. He points out that the helipad is his own small business and that he aspires to make it self-sufficient for a Thirty-year concession that pays an annual fee.

In the long gone 90s and when it was merger with Andre-Kevin, the cheap furniture factory for the middle-middle class which bore the names of his two sons, Saramaga thought about how to rebuild a business he had started with Jorge, his cabinetmaker father who got off the ship that had brought him from the Ukraine. He was running in the year 2000 and he came up with a twist, fproduction of wooden floors for high-end customers.

expectation

At the time it was quite a feat. The company is called Patagonia Flooring and it is the same one that installed the 70% of the floors in Puerto Madero, in the anthill-shaped offices that Mercado Libre It has opened at the Polo Dot, Teatro Colón, CCK, Fortabat Museum, Fine Arts Museum, and even the Miami Museum of Modern Art, among other iconic works.

Saramaga confesses: “2021 and this 2022 were the company’s best years”.

-What are you planning for 2023?

It’s a difficult year. The only thing I can say is that I just know that I know nothing.

Saramaga believes that “an adjustment is coming and as an industry leader I will enjoy it better than others. I have no intention of expanding the company. I go there. If the crisis surprises me in my growth, I turn around. I’m realistic before a year it will be difficult. Einstein taught us that the only measure of human intelligence is the ability to change.

-What is your strategy, what will change?

-I melted and made mistakes many times, it’s the price to keep learning. I have three rules, the first is the vocation for service and humility in front of the customer which is what feeds me. For us, the reference is fundamental. The second is to diversify markets and services: no customer represents more than 3% of sales. And it is essential not to have debts. We had 12 people dedicated to complying with the rules that the banks required. I am an accountant and the bibliography has taught us that we grow based on our debts. In Argentina, having no passivity is essential to staying on your feet.

Like many home products companies, Patagonia Flooring has flourished during the pandemic. Partly. by a constellation of factors: “The behavior of the population with high purchasing power has changed. Many live as if it were their last day and spend. With the obstacles to outside tourism, they have decided to invest in their homes. And they ask for brands. That lawsuit is still alive, I’m up to three months late. There is an acceleration of orders”.

the new paradox

It is curious, lately the highest income comes from the provision of services. Saramaga has joined a Swedish company, at the cutting edge of technology, dedicated to the restoration of wooden floors, in a city like Buenos Aires with 30 million square meters of abandoned floors.

Of course, he still hasn’t found an answer to yet another Argentine paradox. With the tension between the United States and China, his company has orders from overseas to replace the Chinese supplier in the region. “I could export all production if they paid me real dollar. My expenses are $300 and they give me 160. Today we are no longer competitive”.