38
Getting a feeling
for STAFA
In 1977 George van Gool started distributing nuts from a small warehouse in Eindhoven. It was the
product he knew best, having worked in a nut-making factory. Thirty years on and STAFA Holland
could hardly be described as a single product company. In fact, it is far from single dimensional in any
respect, be it range, operation or marketing.
STAFA has just completed a new hall at its Now it is an unavoidable reality that good needs to collect an order in one hour, then we
warehouse complex in Maarheeze – a site the distribution warehouses are rarely remarkable, will have it ready,” says Pim van Leeuwen,
company moved to in 1981. The extension in fact, if they are it normally means problems. responsible for general sales and specifically
brings the warehouse to 12,000 square metres The STAFA operation is what you would expect for Neofast BV, a trading arm set up to provide
providing 15,000 pallet spaces and handling – straightforward, utilising modern logistics flexibility to distribution customers needing
around 25,000 standard fasteners and special systems and evidently highly competent. It a safe and reliable mechanism for importing
items for customers. The range development does the job, effectively, without fuss, with container quantities from Asia. “We have
began in the early 1980s with the addition the good humour that pervades the company, offices in China and Taiwan,” explains Pim,
of bolts, initially from Italian factories, later day in day out. Period. Quality clearly matters “that ensure the quality and reliability of our
imported from Asia. At around the same time – there is a well-equipped dimensional and suppliers. Neofast provides that surety to our
STAFA also entered the Scandinavian market; mechanical testing room, into which a 60 customers and in exchange we earn a small
still very important to a business that has long tonne tensile tester was being installed at the commission. Applying the leverage our total
since extended its export markets throughout time of the visit. More remarkable has been volume gives us, the customer often purchases
Eastern and Southern Europe as well as into the rate of growth – an aerial photograph through Neofast at virtually the same cost as
the UK and Ireland. of the site in 1989 clearly highlights the if they placed a container order direct on a
The STAFA core business is fastener building expansion, much of it driven by range factory.” Between its own stock requirements
distribution, with the emphasis on being ‘solid, development particularly over the last eight and that of Neofast customers STAFA now
definite, reliable’. That means applying thirty years. STAFA is a generalist; the business is handles around twenty-five container loads
years sourcing, logistics and customer service not focused exclusively on specific markets or every week.
experience to, as George puts it, “getting specific customer categories - a characteristic At the opposite end of the scale STAFA
the correct quality at the best price to our that is proving particularly important in the continues to develop the intensity of service
customers, wherever and whoever they are.” current economic climate. it offers user accounts. ‘STAFA Logistics
Approaching 60% of STAFA’s business is now What is common, regardless of market or Solutions’ - “you have to admit it is a snappy
exported to reseller customers. The domestic customer, is commitment to service – STAFA title,” interposes export account manager
business is shared, more or less 50-50, thinks particularly in terms of flexibility and Ivo van Gool. The good-natured banter is
between resellers and industrial fastener users. responsiveness. “If that means a customer characteristically Dutch, and an integral part
of the STAFA culture. Back to the point,
the launch of SLS over the last few months
represents further developments in inventory
management systems offered by STAFA.
Two-bin systems have been provided to
some customers for a while, now a more
comprehensive KanBan system is being
proposed. “We want to expand VMI,” says Pim
van Leeuwen, “rather than just supplying in
boxes and pallets.”
Actually, it isn’t all about boxes and pallets
by any means, as you discover if you take the
short drive to another STAFA company. In 1995
STAFA’s in-house packaging department gained
its independence, relocating to a nearby
industrial unit, and emerging under the name
of Gopak as a specialist packaging company
- truly remarkable for both the technology
it employs and the solutions it delivers. On
one hand Gopak provides a large number of
distribution customers with STAFA fastener
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140