Simian is now also gradually conquering the Belgian market

With spring off to a slow start, I was driving to the village of Westerbroek to be precise, east of the city of Groningen, to conduct an interview with Gerwin Verdonk, Business Officer at Simian. There’s still adequate space there, an euphemism really for a quite sizeable building.
Simian B.V. is the umbrella company for three individual online providers trading as Reclameland.nl, Flyerzone.nl and Drukland.nl. Anyone can order from Simian (not just resellers).
The three online providers have been trading in Belgium for more than ten years now as Reclameland.be, Flyerzone.be and Drukland.be. Gerwin Verdonk pointed out that there are some differences (as well as similarities) between the Dutch and Belgian markets. In fact, there are hardly any ‘native’ online providers of printed matter in Belgium. Obviously, almost all Belgian graphics companies and sign makers have a website, but not in the same sense as a number of Dutch providers of online printing and advertising work.
Operating from its branch in Bruges, Simian aims to significantly increase its 7.5 million euro turnover in Belgium, generated via its subsidiary Drukland.be. “We want to double our Belgian turnover.”
Gerwin Verdonk pointed out that during the recent period the company also focused more on ‘lean manufacturing’: This involved both ‘lining’ and safety. We had already decided to streamline our production (from input at the start to subsequent output). Within this process, however, we defined specific “cells” for a number of product categories.
Our large format departments incorporate the following cells:
Cell 1. Focuses on Durst’s P5 and Zünd ( http://www.zund.com ) finishing machines for printing, cutting and finishing, up to and including final packing and shipping;
Cell 2. Concentrates on printing clothing using a Kornit, or other products using for example the Colorados and the Rhotex, following which Zünd’s cutting machines are used for canvas and textiles;
Cell 3. Deals mainly with the production of banners and flags. Again the entire production chain has been mapped and streamlined to produce optimum results.
Gerwin commented: “The three Zünd G3-3XL-3200 cutters and the large format printers have been particularly busy during this period. Because anyone can order and must be helped quickly to ensure timely deliveries, we focus on a substantial number of individual assignments/jobs that are relatively small in terms of numbers per customer. We feel that it is important to organize everything in such a way that all orders are processed and delivered to the customer as quickly as possible.”
This is a summary of an overview story published in the printed issue of SignPro Europe, issue 1-2022.