With the move from Pijnacker to Waddinxveen, we are not only celebrating a new home, but also the anniversary of SealteQ West. After all, our branch was founded in 2011 and therefore exists ten years this year. A look back and forward with Chris Uittenbogaard, director of SealteQ West, and Martin van der Leest, CEO of SealteQ Group.
SealteQ West: built from the ground up
”It starts with ambition. And after that you need perseverance,” said Martin van der Leest about the desire for his own branch in the The Hague/Rotterdam/Utrecht region ten years ago in 2011. Until then, SealteQ served the rest of the country from the northern Netherlands. ”Due to traffic congestion, traveling over far and not having our own entity in the region for the customer, we decided to start our own branch.” That became SealteQ West.
According to the CEO, the fact that SealteQ West is able to celebrate its anniversary after ten years, as well as having substantial growth ambitions for the future, is due to a critical success factor: the embedding of the SealteQ culture, which has existed since 1973. ,,With a successful track record of years of accumulated expertise and experience, we may say by now. We want to leave the world a little better than we found it.”
A decade ago, for example, a number of colleagues from the Northern Netherlands helped embed that culture by working out of West. Some of them are still working there. There is a lot of room in that culture within the frameworks outlined. ,,We like to see our people develop and grow in our organization. And where things go wrong, we support. We’ve all gone through the wall with our heads once ourselves, so we don’t mind.”
The result, observes the CEO: “Those who continue to see growth like this and continue to drive it, get into a model of continuity and long term. That is what drives SealteQ West and all the other companies under SealteQ Group. Not short-term success.”
Anniversary of SealteQ West coincides with relocation
West’s location ten years ago became the Pijnacker, unknown to SealteQ’s management. ”We actually searched on the basis of a map. Where can you sit and where is space,” says Van der Leest. There, West started in a company building. Three years later, it moved to its second home in Pijnacker, in a vacant office part of an infrastructure company. Meanwhile, even that jacket is too small and SealteQ West is moving to Waddinxveen, to a state-of-the-art building that meets all requirements.
Director of West, Chris Uittenbogaard, is “delighted” with the move to Waddinxveen. ,,Over the past few years, we have all built up the business together and watched it grow. Not only in terms of materials and orders, with a growing circle of regular customers, but also in terms of personnel.” He is proud to be celebrating an anniversary and a move, but “far from smug.
A glimpse into the future
Because the ambition of SealteQ Group, and therefore of West, is a sustainable one. One of medium to long term. ”Not just for the outside world,” said Uittenbogaard. ”The intention is to make it better for everyone in the long run. For our people, our customers and our planet. Without that ambition, we are nothing except wonderful stories and brilliant ideas. But you don’t build a right to exist with that.”