Along the motorway in Herongen , Germany , right on on the Dutch border near Venlo , is a 220,000 - straight - beat site of tremendous importance to the neighborhood . It is house to Veiling Rhein - Maas , the only flower and plant auction in Germany . Around 5 million dealing take seat annually and last year it achieved a turnover rate of more than 420 million euro . If you desire to see this unique business in action , you should get up early , as it is currently the peak season .
Customers are usually on land site from 5 am to scrutinize the offer in person and evaluate the lineament . From Monday to Friday , the auction starts at 6 am . Only on weekends and less than half a dozen public vacation the auction remain unsympathetic . In April and May , there is so much supply that the auction sale starts as early as 5.30am . It always continues until all containers of cut blossom , potted plants and trees are sold , and that can take a long time ! " Thanks to digitalization , it is now also possible to grease one’s palms efflorescence and plants from your armchair , but most customers still prefer to be present on internet site , " Cees Hoekstra , managing conductor of Veiling Rhein - Maas , told visitors from the German - Dutch internet of the Interreg undertaking ' Agropole Innovates ' . This is a German - Dutch projection direct at connecting and strengthening agribusiness in both countries .
The mathematical group of visitors in the unripened - habilitate foyer of Veiling Rhein - Maas
Monday and Wednesdays are the meddling days . This is when there are considerably more product in the auction ’s spacious halls . Daily dollar volume is between 1 and 1.5 million euros and in the mellow season even between 2.5 and 4 million euro . Mondays and Wednesdays are the busiest mean solar day . This is when there are considerably more product in the auction sale ’s spacious halls . everyday upset is between 1 and 1.5 million euro and in the high season even between 2.5 and 4 million euro .
The auction hall of Veiling Rhein - Maas accommodates several hundred client . Eight alfilaria are auction at the same time ; the four clock on the leftfield are for mown flowers , the four clocks on the right for potted plant . " free-base on what they are concerned in , customer choose their place in the auction room , " Hoekstra explains . " The order in which the different flowers and plants are auction is rarely interchange . That manner , customer can always count on when and on which clock the goods will be auctioned that they want to bid on . "
The supply at the auction is seasonal : around Valentine ’s Day , red roses are very popular , while around Easter many yellow flowers and plants are bought . It sometimes happens that no tender is placed and thus no buyer is find out for the commodity . " This as luck would have it happens seldom and look on the measure offered and the need . mostly , these are very small quantities . "
The logistics center of attention of Veiling Rhein - Maas is located straight off behind the vendue Granville Stanley Hall . From a platform , visitors can see what occur behind the scenes to deliver the goods to the high-pitched bidder as chop-chop as possible . Here too , the separation of potted plants and cut heyday continues , which has to do not only with the goods being sell , but also with the different load common carrier used to carry the goods . While plants are often sold by whole cart and transported through the manse via a 10 - km - long chain conveyor , it is a fleck more complicated with cut heyday on the other side of the hall . Cut prime are often bought in modest lots , which think that all the buckets of flowers for each customer have to be put together by hired man by the auction sale stave .
" We currently have about 350 permanent employees in different section . alas , we are also get from the shortage in the toil market , which is why we are looking at how we can optimise our processes even more to continue serve our customers in the future , " Hoekstra says . " During the auction there is always a short break , partly to give customers a breather and part to give the employee of Veiling Rhein - Maas a head embark on in assign and distribute the cargo attack aircraft carrier to ravish the auctioneer flowers and industrial plant to the client as quickly as possible . "
Veiling Rhein - Maas is the only blossom and works vendue in Germany . There are similar auction bridge in the Netherlands , but they operate almost solely digitally . The theory to inspect and bid on the good yourself on site is no longer available in the Netherlands . The Herongen auction was make in 2010 from a joint speculation of two Landgard auction sale in Germany and the Royal Flora Holland auction in Venlo . The merger of the three auction sale has guide to even nearer grouchy - border cooperation between the two neighbouring nation , something the Agropole Innovates squad is peachy to see .
A peep inside the auction bridge room
After the sojourn to Veiling Rhein - Maas , the morning was not over yet . As a wholesaler , Schultz Blumenhandel und Logistik is the link between the auction bridge and their client , which include many garden centres . Senior handler Jürgen Schultz sits in the auction elbow room himself every morn and tries to grease one’s palms the good order by their customers at the auction at the best toll . The logistics section base at the auction ensures that the plants auctioned in the forenoon are already in the garden centres up to 100 kilometer away by 2 pm . This is a Brobdingnagian logistical effort , but it check that the quality of the flowers and plant that end up in those garden eye is very in high spirits . There are currently 17 trucks driving for Schultz , but there could certainly be 20 . " It is very difficult to feel drivers , " tell Jürgen Schultz . " And then they do n’t even have to aim foresightful aloofness with us . All our number one wood are back home by dinner party prison term . " Despite all the challenge , the efflorescence and works business remains the Schultz fellowship ’s heat . The visitant present were capable to see for themselves why : the flowered splendor in the halls of Veiling Rhein - Maas and its affiliated companies frame a grin on your face every day .
For more information : veil Rhein - Maas[email protected]www.veilingrheinmaas.com
