city guide

Canals and creative spirits share center stage in this historic business hub.

Amsterdam, as any visitor soon notices, is an incredibly compact city, as well as a breathtakingly beautiful one. As the capital of a small country, with a correspondingly limited internal market, Amsterdam has been doing business internationally out of necessity for much of its long history. In fact, those elegant gabled merchant houses that line the peaceful canals once presided over the world’s leading trading empire. Back in the 17th century, the city was known as “the warehouse of the world.”

During this so-called Golden Age, the Dutch developed many of the institutions of modern business life and society, from multinational companies and share trading to the concept of the nuclear family. No wonder if Amsterdam seems somehow familiar—New York, after all, used to be New Amsterdam. More than 90 percent of old Amsterdam’s population speaks English, often with an American accent acquired from the movies. With its outward-looking orientation and genuinely international business climate (representatives of 177 different nations live and work here, and more than 1,400 foreign companies have set up offices), the city is a relatively easy and thoroughly enjoyable place for business travelers to navigate.

“The Netherlands has had strong business links with the USA for around 250 years,” says Dennis Cowles, a Bostonian who has lived in Europe for more than 25 years and currently serves as a board member of the Amsterdam American Business Club (aabc.nl). “There are many similarities in the way business is done here. The Dutch are very straightforward to deal with. They like to see that you’re prepared, and while the decision-making process is careful, it’s not as complex as in the UK.”

Business the Dutch way


But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t differences, says Eleonore Breukel, the founder of Intercultural Communication BV (intercultural.nl) consultancy in Amsterdam, which counts Unilever, Deloitte and Johnson & Johnson among its clients. “There is a big difference in work ethic between the USA and the Netherlands,” she points out. “In the Netherlands, we have a work/life balance that Americans find hard to understand.” Business hours are strictly observed, and overtime must be tactfully requested in advance.

It follows that Dutch business contacts will often not appreciate an invitation to dinner, as this is seen as encroaching on cherished home time. There is no tradition of sharing business information over food, as in France. “My advice would be to ask contacts to dinner [only] if absolutely necessary,” Breukel advises. “And if you need to motivate Dutch workers, free time works much better than money.”

Foreigners doing business with Dutch companies are quickly struck by the large numbers of meetings that seem to take place on a weekly basis. While it may be tempting to skip these, Breukel warns against it. “Meetings in the USA usually function to convey decisions to employees,” she says. “So it’s worth remembering that in the Netherlands, they exist in order for everyone to be heard. All employees get to say what they think at meetings—it’s a way of getting them on board to support the decisions that are made.”

Even when you want to impress a Dutch prospect, be careful not to seem boastful, adds Dennis Cowles. “Avoid hyperbole,” he suggests. “Don’t try to oversell your business here. Dutch people are down-to-earth, so they just want the facts. They simply want to know how to create a win-win situation.” Breukel agrees: “The client is king in the USA, but not in the Netherlands. Here, supplier and prospect are both 50 percent responsible for any deal, and the client has to decide the deal is good. So any form of pressure is seen as unethical.” To help clinch the deal, she instead recommends “offering something free after the deal, such as some form of service package.”

Inevitably, doing business Dutch-style means dealing with a certain amount of red tape. “There seems to be a rule for just about everything!” laughs Cowles. He recommends the Amsterdam Chamber of Commerce as a first contact in such cases. The Amsterdam Foreign Investment Office (afio.amsterdam.nl) also offers advice and assistance, particularly if you intend to set up a local office. For networking, the American Business Club hosts monthly lunches, and the internationally oriented Network Club Amsterdam (network-club.com) also has regular events.

When in Amsterdam, give yourself time to get inspired by the scenery and the mix of creative business brains at work. As Lee Feldman, of interactive Web company BlastRadius Europe, says, “Amsterdam is a city full of creative spirits, people who share a slightly unusual view of life and who frequently have a completely different picture of how they want their work life to be. They are always looking beyond the usual boundaries, wanting to try new things. That’s the feeling you get all over the city. It inspires me with more fresh ideas and concepts than anywhere else would.”

Take some time out

How to enjoy the city? Amsterdam’s lovely canal-laced center remains a beautiful place to stroll, cycle or take a canal boat (and the city does look wonderful from the water), while imagining the vanished glories of the past. But, although Amsterdam has more than 50 museums and a wealth of historic monuments, it also has an intriguing and rapidly developing modern side. In recent years, a stylish new quarter of the city has been taking shape in the formerly derelict docklands—composed of artificial islands and peninsulas—to the east of the old center. These Eastern Islands boast a wealth of modern buildings every bit as beautiful, in their own way, as those of 17th-century Amsterdam—but don’t have nearly as many crowds.

To explore this new area, you can take a guided tour (amsterdam.info), or alternatively get a map from ARCAM, the Amsterdam Architecture Center, and start by hopping on tram 10. The contemporary architecture here is some of the world’s best, and it makes a great contrast to the old city. In addition, there’s great designer shopping clustered along the KNSM-Laan on KNSM Eiland. You can even stay here (at the trendy Lloyd Hotel, which also has a pleasant restaurant), or just dine at London chef Jamie Oliver’s Amsterdam outpost, Fifteen. And in good weather, a drink on a dockside café among the sailing boats is one of the city’s great pleasures. You can take a canal cruise (canal.nl) by candlelight, with pizza, Thai food or jazz—but the best, and most luxurious, way to see the canals is alone, and preferably at sunrise or sunset. Charter a private boat with a skipper, choose your route, sit back, and drink in the atmosphere.

The Film Museum (filmmuseum.nl), headquartered in the Vondel Park (with a wonderful terrace for lunch, in fine weather), organizes a variety of special screenings, including regular classics in the art deco Tuschinski Cinema, silent films with live music accompaniment, and open-air screenings in the Vondelpark. The emphasis is on European film. A peek into the past can be found at Museum van Loon (museumvanloon.nl). This grand 1672 canal house on the Keizersgracht remains much as it was in its heyday, and gives an excellent impression of everyday life for Amsterdam’s wealthy merchant class in the Golden Age. The beautiful formal gardens are also as they were in the 17th century. Amsterdam’s central canals have two excellent exhibition spaces for photography: Foam (foam.nl) and Huis Marseille (huismarseille.nl) both feature changing programs showcasing a wide variety of top-quality work in the medium, from work by young American Ryan McGinley to the 1930s press images of WeeGee.

Downtime: What to see and do in Amsterdam

Essentials: Where to stay, where to dine
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JANE SZITA is a freelance writer in Amsterdam.