Metallurgist Bert Meij has been on the road with wear technology for 22 years. Once started in the warehouse where he made everything findable with the help of the computer. Did sales from behind the desk and has now been in the field for 14 years. His territory? Benelux and France!
'This is where the future of recycling is clearly visible,' Bert tells us incessantly as we visit SCP in Zaandam. 'Concrete is 'harvested' from demolition - nowadays called "urban mining" - then crushed, reduced in size and processed into cement and concrete. That is sold as a finished product here at the factory gate. Everything is done electrically here - unless the weather is momentarily bad. On the roof are as many as 18,000 solar panels. This is recycling and cyclical enterprise at its best. No CO2 footprint! Processing and reusing demolition waste with mobile crushers on site also has a great future'.
Friends at the kitchen table
'As an 'outside man' at Geha, I was really thrown in at the deep end. There were basically no colleagues on the road to take me in tow. In retrospect, that was a good thing. I could chart my own course and was given plenty of time to do so. "Making friends" in the industry instead of going on sales-path to customers. As a result, I now often sit at the kitchen table with clients. You then hear how everything is going, what is going well and what is going wrong, the real story! I then try to think along the road from good to better and further...'.
Love for Shredders
When it comes to shredding technology, shredders are really my thing, I admit, but...crushers right after that!', Bert states with a laugh. It seems he not only knows every shredder within his working area but also has the specifications of all of them ready. 'Shredder set-ups are never the same. Each configuration, in combination with seven and discharge conveyors is different. The trick is to fine-tune the interaction so that the result is achieved faster and better. The smaller, the cleaner the result, the more it yields.'
Unique feature
Six years ago, Bert was joined by about ten colleagues in the field. At the time, I often visited Laverman, but of course there was no knowledge sharing, Bert says. The way we work together as a team, also with everyone inside, is bizarre; there is no rivalry. If you don't know, you call your colleague and solve it together. Our customers really appreciate the fact that we think in terms of solutions that really matter. Perhaps Geha Laverman is unique in this.
