By Roel Dreve
In a new fashion MYCELIUM
Bert Rademakers already has quite a chequered career in the sector. Now, with Simon Hoenderop, he is striking out in a new direction. With one foot just about in the mushroom industry, and the other taking a step outside. A parting of ways, but above all a new beginning.
come to change track. “I liked mushrooms until they were on the beds and had to be picked”, he laughs.
Exotic Mushrooms Bert Rademakers and Simon Hoenderop at Mycelium Materials Europe in Hedel. B
We are the only party for our American
partner that can scale up quickly.
18 MUSHROOM BUSINESS
ert was already working on his father’s mushroom farm in Ammerzoden when he was 14. His father let him get on with some
‘experiments’, but he wanted to do more than just follow in his father’s footsteps. Via his laboratory study, he ended up at the University of Wageningen, from where he performed research at the experimental station in Horst for his graduation thesis. He joined the Mushroom School (CCO) in 1987, when it was experiencing a boom. “I look back with fondness on that time. I could have gone to work abroad or as a manager, but in the end I built a new farm with my wife Hannie in 1991. I couldn’t resist the urge to have my own company.” Even back then, he toyed with the idea of growing exotic mushrooms, but initially restricted himself to growing white mushrooms. “We did become a trial site for Somycel, to test mother cultures of the U1. That later became International Spawn and Sylvan.” At the end of the 1990s the mushroom sector went through a rough patch and Bert felt more strongly that the time had
In 1998, he visited Patrick Romanens, and made a license agreement with a bulk system developed by him, which was all still very small-scale. “A year later we added the first bulk sterilisation system for shiitake, I wanted to grow shiitake on my own substrate. In 2000, Fungi 2000 was founded, which gave me a trio of activities: mushrooms + shiitake + shiitake substrate. There were also other people making substrate for exotics, but they all worked with autoclaves, and I saw more in the bulk system. But setting that up alone was complicated. He found two allies in the shape of Wim Arts and Douwe Treurniet from CNC. “CNC also wanted to diversify so together we founded CNC Exotic Mushrooms (CEM).” This signalled the birth of a fruitful collaboration, which gave Rademakers freedom to concentrate on making substrate. From 2004, the company saw annual growth of around 15-20%, the production capacity had doubled four years later and the range also included other strains. In 2013 CEM expanded from 2 to 4 mixing lines and production and sales kept on growing, especially internationally. “The market for exotics also grew, of course, and that world became increasingly professional. The company has relatively little competition.” Not from Chinese imports? “Yes, that competition does not go unnoticed, but there is still enough space for European products, even if only because of the strong trend towards using organic and ‘local’ substrate.” According to Rademakers, this latest development is not that evident in the Netherlands. “The lowest price is still the primary consideration here.”
New direction
But being awarded a new FD Gazellen prize - an award for the fastest growing companies in the
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