History in a nutshell

Lakwijk Kunststoffen BV is a family business. The founder was Frank Lakwijk in 1977. After working for years at a plastics wholesaler, he thought he could do better himself and started his own business from the shed of the then house.

Initially it involved trading in plates, rods and tubes as a link between manufacturers and the manufacturing industry, machining companies, advertising, interior construction and glaziers.

Lakwijk's creative DNA still owes itself to founder Frank Lakwijk. He anticipated developments in the market well and was educated by his customers. He continually adapted his range and added value to his services. It started with cutting to size and drilling holes and eventually Lakwijk has grown into an all-round technically high-quality processor in addition to its function as a wholesaler.

Unfortunately, due to excessively rapid growth and customers experiencing payment problems, the young company went bankrupt in 1982. However, supported by suppliers, customers and staff, Frank was able to make a good restart and use the lessons learned to set up a new organization. A company with the same foundation of customer focus and creativity, but also with controlled growth.

In 1995, a smaller second branch was established in Goes (Zeeland). After the collaboration with the first branch manager did not work out well, his younger right-hand man took over that role.

Mark Lakwijk, son of Frank and Ria and the current director, started working at the Goes branch during its second start-up phase after previously gaining experience in Den Bosch.

After Frank Lakwijk took on a new challenge in Asia in 1998, Ria Lakwijk -van Stiphout continued the company with Hans Verploegen as director, who at that time had been active as manager for years. During that time, Lakwijk made the transition to a machining processor. René de Haas, who has worked at Lakwijk since 1984, played an important role as manager.

In 2008, a large-scale renovation took place and the company was given new management. René de Haas and Mark Lakwijk then took over. René had already been working at Lakwijk for 25 years. Mark had already worked at Lakwijk in Den Bosch and at the branch in Goes in an earlier phase, but had gained experience elsewhere in the intervening ten years.

In the economically difficult years between 2008 and 2014, Lakwijk's turnover continued to grow steadily and the company invested in the future by investing in the competencies of people, the technical capabilities of the machinery and automation.

In 2017, the neighbor's building at Moeskampweg number 8 was added to our own building and in this way the surface area for warehouse, workshop and offices was more than doubled. 

This made it possible to continue the line of expansion in technical possibilities, automation and production capacity. The adjacent building at number 8a was also added to the Lakwijk production floor in early 2022. This paved the way for a thorough renovation of part of the building to prepare it for further growth and is also a great step in the context of sustainability. 

The most recent expansion of the building fitted perfectly within the plan we developed in 2021 to double our production capacity and further expand our technical capabilities in several phases between 2021 and 2025. This increase in production capacity was intended to be fully automated and robotized.

In retrospect, the production capacity has increased far beyond doubling, while the need for additional employees has grown only modestly. Increasing labour productivity was an important objective during this phase.