ZUIDAS. Magazine

Pedro Celli (30) hails from the Brazilian city of Campinas, close to Sao Paulo, but has been living in the Netherlands ever since he was 13. He studied International Business at Groningen University and works as an account executive for ZOOM, a company connecting communication and technology. He starts every working day with a work-out at 7 am.

“It’s only since I’ve been working at Zuidas that I have the feeling I am actually working. It is a totally different atmosphere compared to inner city Amsterdam. Zuidas has become a major financial district so you realize that this is the place where business is done and where things happen.”

“Since I’ve been working at Zuidas I get up early, at 6 am. Then it’s straight to the gym at Club Sportive for a yoga, boxing or HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) class. A quick shower and then I’m off to work.  I get myself a cup of coffee and some breakfast and start reading my emails. That’s when my working day starts.”

“I like this routine a lot better than going to the gym in the evening, which I used to do a few times a week. Those sessions were much longer and a lot tougher. Now I enter the office full of energy instead of feeling knackered. Another advantage of doing my workout in the morning is that my girlfriend can go to her gym in the evening so I can look after our little kitten.”

Martijn van Herwijnen is co-owner of bespoke suits store Sarto Undici. In his column, he offers tips and discusses the latest trends in men’s fashion.

Dandy or Denim? Once upon a time, things were so easy: a dark-grey or blue suit, worn with a blue or red tie. This used to be a winning combination, but not anymore. 

When I’m walking around the Zuidas, I see three stereotypes. First, the classic three-piece suit, preferably grey, worn by men of a certain age with important jobs.

Then there is the ‘dandy’, wearing a nice jacket, chinos, matching shirt and the right accessories: a colourful pocket square, nice watch, leather briefcase. He’s a man of taste who likes to look good.

But there’s also a third category and their numbers are growing: men who used to wear a normal suit but switched to jeans and a white or blue shirt they previously wore with their now-discarded suit. Maybe I’m wrong but my guess is that this type of man considers ‘dandy’ an offensive word. 

To me, as co-owner of bespoke suits store Sarto Undici, the word dandy has no bad connotation at all. Originally, it signified a man who cared about his appearance but did not take himself too seriously. 

The way we dress keeps changing and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. What is bad, however, is not caring how you look, wearing your suit like a bus driver: too long, too big, too wide, lacking colour and imagination. Or simply going for the trusted jeans and jacket combo, the so-called “modern uniform”. With a bit of effort we can all look so much better and more stylish. Isn’t it pretty easy to look a lot better?

My tip for all men is straightforward: challenge yourself, throw out the jeans and release your inner dandy. 

Martijn van Herwijnen

Sarto Undici

The residential towers at Zuidas are real eye-catchers, housing wonderful apartments with large balconies and terraces. Great places to live but as Zuidas is pretty quiet in the evenings, it is a challenge to guarantee safety on the streets for local residents. Cue the newly-established Zuidas Nighwatch.

It is Monday morning and there is a real buzz around Intermezzo, one of the stunning buildings here at Zuidas. We meet Emile Rietveld (35), first resident of this stately building and chairman of Intermezzo’s Property Owners Association.

We talk to Emile to discuss a new initiative he started: giving people living at Zuidas area the same feeling of security one could expect in a village or a suburb. “Due to the high-rise buildings and the fact that Zuidas is pretty quiet in the evenings, that’s a bit of a challenge”, he honestly admits. 

Rich pickings…

It is no secret that thieves like to hang around Zuidas. And that’s pretty logical, Emile says. “One way or another, the area offers rich pickings. A lot of famous Dutchmen and other successful people live here. They have money, expensive stuff. Plus there is much less social control and that creates a fertile stomping ground for malicious people. But we do our best to fight that!”, Emile hastens to add. 

So he came up with Avenue Services – The Zuidas Nighwatch. “In other countries, having a professional neighbourhood watch is quite common. With the international appeal of  Zuidas it was only a matter of time until a collective monitoring system would be introduced here as well.”

“It starts with discouraging people who have wrong intentions. We do that by being visibly present, also in the evenings and at night, and talking to people on the street, asking them what is going on – these are things thieves and burglars don’t like. This is what happens automatically in other neighbourhoods with a higher level of social control and more people on the streets at night. We don’t have that here so we’ll need to create such an atmosphere.” 

Concierge Plus

Emile’s security professionals will be moving around the area on a… Segway. “I’d like to call what we offer a Concierge Plus service. A concierge in a building has a relationship of trust with the residents; he knows them and helps them or visitors to and from their car or the train station, for example.” 

He continues: “The space around Intermezzo and the nearby area is actually too small to monitor by car. By patrolling on a Segway, we are agile, relatively fast (around 12 miles per hour) and we stand a little bit taller. We will be doing our rounds from 10 pm to 6 am. These night guards, myself included, will be keeping an eye out in this area”, he explains.

He has already completed a few test rounds. “It struck me that not all the entrance doors to the buildings are locked. Well, that’s just asking for trouble. When we run into suspicious-looking fellows or people who have no reason to be here at night, we’ll approach them. If they have bad intentions they usually disappear out of sight very quickly.”

Professional social control

This new security initiative has been met with enthusiasm by local business owners and the residents of Intermezzo and the surrounding buildings. “These people and their property deserve to be well-protected. Thankfully there is money to realize this kind of professional social control. This service is a collective supported by the local business owners and residents. They all benefit from this system”, Emile says. 

He has so much confidence in this new way of creating a safe environment that he has said goodbye to his old career in order to launch Avenue Services. “I used to work in the aviation and telecommunications industries as a consultant on risk assessment and incident investigation. I have a lot of knowledge of risk control and safety, plus I have a good network.”

Good social skills

At the moment he is busy building his team. “We are carefully selecting people to carry out these shifts. As we are not a traditional security company, professional training in security is not a hard requirement. What we do expect, however, is a good eye for suspect behaviour, good social skills and a willingness to approach people. You could say we are a human level of crime prevention, alongside monitoring cameras and other – invisible – security measures.” 

Emile emphasizes that his ‘Segway riders’ will not intervene in case of any wrongdoings. “No, they will immediately contact the police. The municipality and the police are fully behind this concept. Our cooperation with the police has already proven successful as we recently managed to help the police to arrest three burglars in Zuidas area.”

photo Katja Mali

In the digital age the world is at our feet. Yet we all know how long it can take the find the perfect hotel. And once we’ve managed to get that ‘dream spot’ we soon find out it’s either fully booked or – even worse – it’s nowhere near as perfect as the pictures on the website suggested. Together with her team, owner Marianne Kuiper of Efficient Hotel Partner provides a good old-fashioned travel service.

In Amstelveen’s Oude Dorp area we meet Marianne and her 5-strong team in the stylish office that has been the home of Efficient Hotel Partner (EHP) for 21 years now. “Yeah, we’ve finally grown up”, Marianne laughs. “Many people celebrate being 20 or 25 years in a certain business, but we liked the idea of celebrating the age of maturity for EHP.”

First things first: what does Efficient Hotel Partner do exactly? “We arrange suitable accommodation for our clients”, she explains. “Whenever companies are looking for a venue to hold a training course, meeting, brainstorm session or a congress – with or without overnight stay – we help them find the location that’s perfect for their needs. Every one of us here is specialized in a certain field so we really complement each other.”

Carefree outsourcing

“Jacco Verschoor, the only man in our team, is a travel industry veteran and Jennifer Lam, who has worked for large hotel chains in Australia, is our expert in complex bookings. Mieke van Middelkoop is the creative mind and Mirna van Driel is our source of information and financial expert. As for me, I worked for the Bilderberg Group for 15 years. Together we operate in a fast, effective and, as our name suggests, efficient manner. Above all, we really love our jobs and our clients can feel that. Our reward? A happy client. And a happy client is someone who will definitely use our service again.”

In this day and age everything can be arranged from our comfy chair using online platforms such as Booking.com and Trivago. So why should companies contact Efficient Hotel Partner? “When a secretary is asked to book a nice venue for a brainstorm session – with or without overnight stay – for a group of 20 to 200 people, she’ll start looking on Google. She probably has a few ideas and her colleagues will chime in as well. She’ll start emailing to see if the venue is available at the requested date, then she’ll ask for a few prices and presents the plan to her boss. Maybe the programme needs to contain a fun outing, like a guided bicycle ride, a boat tour, or sheep-shearing. Again she’ll start looking around, asking for prices. It’s a hell of a task and very time-consuming.”

Your Personal Assistant

What does EHP have to offer, other than what people can find out themselves? “Good old-fashioned service, personal contact. A voice listening to you at the other end of the line, someone asking you what you need and acting upon this information. We’ve noticed that people really want this. After a period of economic crisis and online bookings, there’s a growing demand for personal service. No phone menu, no ‘do it yourself’. You could say we are a kind of personal assistant to our clients.”

“From the very first day we’ve managed to build a solid reputation; we know the Netherlands inside out and we’ve visited virtually all hotels and meeting venues. We’ve built a great client base and we’re very proud of that. Our secret? We love our clients and that feeling is mutual. That’s our trademark and the reason why large companies like Nationale-Nederlanden and Henkel, but also DJ Martin Garrix, like to do business with us. ”

Sharp and creative

So many companies, so many employees, so many requirements. How do you manage to meet all their different needs? “People experience fragmentation; they have to deal with myriads of suppliers and suffer from choice overload. We structure the booking process, making it easier for them. And we ask our clients lots of questions: What is your budget? What do you prefer: city, countryside, or the coast? Should the accommodation be easily accessible by public transport; is parking space required? Are there any foreign guests that need to be picked up from Schiphol Airport? Once we know the ins and outs of their request we start our search and soon after we send them proposals for a few venues. Plus we do all the invoicing so the client only has to deal with one supplier: us.” 

The interview for this magazine was conducted in a beautifully decorated room, the Music Meeting Lounge, at a separate location but under the same roof as EHP. This is Marianne’s youngest brainchild. “I really missed having guests around me so I came up with the idea of having our own meeting venue. A location in Amstelveen’s Oude Dorp, at walking distance from De Poel and the Amsterdamse Bos, where hospitality is written in capital letters.” 

This year the Music Meeting Lounge was hailed as the best small-scale meeting venue in the province of Noord-Holland. A very nice award to receive. “Not bad, given that our Meeting Lounge only opened 18 months ago!”

Efficient Hotel Partner
Badlaan 1 bis
Amstelveen

T 020 345 2322
W www.efficienthotelpartner.nl

Picture: Marianne Kuiper wears a red coat

Having been born and raised in India, at the age of twenty four Simmer Madan choose to study and work in London. There she met her husband, and started combining life in London with a job in Denmark. However, for three years now she has been living in The Netherlands, “we stay here and nowhere else,” she tells me. 

For the first time in nine years, she went back to London this September. “I was shocked! It was so much more crowded. People kept pouring out of the underground. In London, it took me twenty minutes to get from work to the underground. Here I am home in twenty minutes.” 

Simmer can hardly find anything negative to say about living in The Netherlands. Apart from “the language, that’s hard. What does help is reading product advertisements and ads about houses-for-sale in newspapers. That way, you learn ordinary words. I shop at Bol.com, so now I know what douchegel is.”

She gained a lot from the government’s integration course, which she had to take because of her marriage to a naturalized Dutchman. “As a result, when I started to use public transport, I knew how to use the OV-chip card. As well as that you learn how to shop at Albert Heijn, very convenient.”

Open minded

In Simmer’s experience, the UK promotes a somewhat hierarchical relationship between people, while people in The Netherlands are more open-minded. “It is easier to approach people here, plus the fact that people think in terms of solutions.”

After completing a BA in Psychology, she studied an MBA in Business and Finance. She now works as a project manager with a company in financial services in the Atrium building at Zuidas.

“The Zuidas neighbourhood is just a marvellous work environment. People are friendly, and people often know each other, which offers lots of opportunities. The atmosphere is super-competitive however, there are more people than jobs. It is booming.”

Life is very relaxed in Amstelveen, where Simmer lives with her husband. “We wanted a house with a garden, but that did not work out in Amsterdam. And very important: we needed a room that both my parents and parents-in-law from India could stay in when they visit us. Furthermore, we are only 12 minutes from Schiphol Airport, there are many restaurants around us, and we have our friends nearby. So, we are not going to live anywhere else than here.”