How can members of a young cluster be encouraged to trust each other enough to share specialists and orders?

The secret of the Ukrainian Thermal Energy Cluster is highly practical: take off the ties and go to the shop floor. Their “Company Visit” practice has transformed ordinary factory tours into a powerful B2B matchmaking tool. Discover how structured production visits turn into real contracts — and why an honest conversation by the assembly line works better than any formal meeting.

“A live visit to a production site provides more than any presentation — you immediately understand who you can work with and how to scale cooperation,” — Tetiana Toropova, CEO of Mario

Practice Passport

Practice Title	Company Visit (Regular Visits to Member Production Facilities)
Cluster / Source Organization	Ukrainian Thermal Energy Cluster
Region	Kyiv
Implementation Period	Ongoing (since 2023)
Cluster Maturity Level	Formalized cluster in an early stage of maturity
Number of Participants	27
Thematic Areas	Networking, Matchmaking (B2B, Cluster2Cluster), Cluster Communications & PR
Target Audience	Young manufacturing clusters seeking to overcome fear of competition

Context and Problem Addressed by the Practice

Established in 2023, the Ukrainian Thermal Energy Cluster faced a typical challenge of “young associations”: a lack of horizontal trust. Entrepreneurs knew each other only through business cards or websites. As a result, no one had a clear understanding of partners’ real capacities, available machinery, or unique technological capabilities.

What was not working? Standard online meetings and formal board sessions remained superficial. Companies were reluctant to open their processes to potential “competitor-spies.” The absence of systematic in-person interaction hindered the creation of joint projects and internal value chains. Participants continued to look for contractors externally, despite having the necessary resources within the cluster.

Description of the Practice Mechanism (“What’s Under the Hood”)

The practice takes place regularly (once a month) and follows a structured format that transforms a factory visit into a business session.

Key elements of the cycle:

• CEO Presentation (mandatory pitch): The host company’s owner or director openly shares key information — success story, real scale (metrics), product range, available capacities, and future plans. This establishes transparency.
• Gemba (shop floor visit): The core of the practice. Participants go directly to the production floor. For example, a visit to Mario ME Ltd allowed partners to observe the full production cycle of designer heated towel rails — from raw materials to packaging. This is where practical questions arise: “How did you solve this technical issue?” or “Can you produce this component for me?”
• Reflection & Matchmaking: After the visit, an informal session is held where participants exchange insights and formalize agreements on orders or resource sharing.

Stakeholder roles:

• Cluster management: Acts as moderator, manages the visit schedule, and tracks “B2B sparks” (agreements) for follow-up
• Host company: Demonstrates openness and sets the standard of transparency
• Participants (guests): Actively seek collaboration opportunities

Resources and Preconditions

This practice is self-sustaining and does not require grants. It is funded through membership fees (organizational costs) and the hospitality of participating companies.

The key precondition is the presence of 2–3 leading companies willing to open their facilities first. Their example removes psychological barriers for others. Without genuine willingness to share experience, the format risks becoming a formal excursion.

Results and Outcomes

Within a short period, the practice delivered tangible results: 18 SMEs participated in visits, and 4 direct B2B cooperation agreements were concluded as a direct outcome.

Qualitative changes:

• Significant increase in trust: Empathy among business owners grew as they saw shared production challenges
• Exchange of specialists: The cluster launched temporary “leasing” of scarce specialists between companies
• Open-door culture: Participants stopped viewing each other as competitors and began seeing each other as resources — shifting from “I’ll do it myself” to “let’s load your idle machine with my order”

Sustainability of the Practice

The sustainability of the practice is ensured by its immediate commercial value. Participants see that each visit can generate new contracts or solve technical problems. With minimal costs and high emotional and financial returns, members are motivated to continue the initiative for years.

Limitations and Risks

• Pool exhaustion risk: With monthly visits, the list of host companies may be exhausted within two years. A second cycle should focus on new products or involve external stakeholders (buyers, authorities) to turn the format into a PR tool.
• Industrial espionage risk: Some companies may fear technology copying. Cluster management must establish ethical non-disclosure standards and pre-agree on what can be shown.

Lessons Learned and Recommendations for Clusters4Regions

Key lesson: Gemba (going to the place where value is created) is the foundation of cluster logic. Until CEOs look each other in the eye on real production floors, no smart specialization strategy will work.

Recommendations:

• Start with respected industry leaders
• Keep visits concise (2–3 hours is sufficient)
• Always moderate the final session to ensure concrete collaboration proposals
• The most valuable asset of a cluster is not its management office, but the production capacity of its members — let people see it firsthand

The presentation of the case study is available via the link:

This practice has been included in the Ukraine Best Practice Guide, which we are developing as part of the Clusters4Regions project.

To be among the first to receive the full version of the Guide, please complete the short pre-registration form.

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Clusters4Regions is an initiative aimed at designing and implementing cluster programs in six regions of Ukraine (Vinnytsia, Volyn, Sumy, Odesa, Khmelnytskyi, and Ternopil regions). The initiative is implemented by the Ukrainian Cluster Alliance at the request of the Ministry of Economy, Environment and Agriculture of Ukraine, with the support of the Swiss-Ukrainian project “Ukraine`s Cohesion and Regional Development” UCORD, and is aligned with EU priorities, international donor frameworks, and Ukraine’s recovery agenda.