Kom in de Kas: looking back

24/4/2015
Tomato
Talk
Kom in de Kas: looking back
As you already know, Looije devoted a lot attention to the
‘After an interesting #komindekas day, we then picked up some
Kom in de Kas (Visit the Greenhouse) event during the
@looije tomatoes. ‘new greens addiction.’
weekend of 11 and 12 April. During this weekend, we received
more than 20,000 people who were interested in what we do at
‘@looijetomaten @joslooije Great company and delicious
our greenhouses in Naaldwijk.
tomatoes. I now understand why this tomato is only sold by
specialist greengrocers.’
As you can imagine, we didn’t let our visitors leave without
tasting our Honeytomatoes® and Dreamtomatoes®. Many
After receiving such nice compliments, we can only conclude
of them confirmed what we have known all along: that our
that the weekend was a success. We would like to take this
tomatoes are scrumptious. People also used social media to
opportunity to thank all of you very much for your help.
express their opinions:
Without you, it wouldn’t have been possible to have everything
run so smoothly.
‘We really enjoyed your guided tour and those delightful dream
–and especially the honey tomatoes. We have a new favourite.
We also wanted to give some employees who worked during
#komindekas2015’
that weekend a chance to talk about their experience.
Jose
and “How long are the stems?” We even had two
police officers to visit. It was a very good day
and it surprised me that there were also so many
children. We had prepared a quiz for them: they
had to answer a question at each location they
visited. I heard that we had even more visitors on
Sunday. So the whole weekend was a great success.
Linda
Like Jose, I also helped in the greenhouse. After
the kick-off on Thursday, 9 April with Monique
Smit and 100 primary school children performing
a drum choreography on tomato skippy balls,
it was time for people to come and see our
greenhouse that weekend. Our visitors were really
excited about seeing what we do. We heard them
remarking about what a beautiful company we
have and how everything looks so orderly and
efficient. We also heard nice things about what
they thought of our tomatoes that so many of
them tasted. Some parents had brought their
children along - kids who usually wouldn’t touch
a tomato but were snacking away on our sweet
honeytomatoes®. Actually, I was asked some totally
unexpected questions. Many of them involved
the pails containing “pink liquid” hanging along
the concrete paths. People thought this might
be a kind of insecticide. Other questions were
Jose
Hello - I’m Jose Zwinkels and I’ve been working at Looije
for more than two years now. I turn Avalantino tomatoes in
Greenhouse 2 in Naaldwijk. My hobby is breeding pedigree
dogs: Shelties and Rottweilers. I also like to paint and wallpaper.
As you know, we were involved in Kom in de Kas last week. I
was there to help out in the greenhouse on Saturday. To begin
with, we all received a nice white shirt with the Looije logo. The
first visitors arrived exactly at 10:00 a.m. Not long after that,
we had a crowd. They just kept coming all day long, despite the
bad weather. All of our visitors were very interested in finding
out everything about our greenhouses. Two commonly asked
questions were: “For how long do the tomato plants grow?”
“How do you get the honey into the tomatoes?
Do you use hypodermic needles?” Obviously, we explained
that the pink liquid in the pails was a disinfectant used for our
hands as well as our secateurs and knives so that we wouldn’t
spread any diseases, etc. to other paths, and that we don’t put
any honey into the tomatoes - it’s just the name we give them
because they’re so sweet. There were also many remarks made
about interplanting. People thought that growing young plants
between old ones was quite unusual. There were also many
people who had their picture taken with the bumblebee who
wandered in and out of the greenhouse. It was a very successful
day. The excitement among our visitors and the efforts of all
of us working at Looije definitely contributed to this fantastic
result. I can’t wait for the next Kom in de Kas
Mark
The big day had finally arrived. It was Thursday, 9 April: the
grand opening of Kom in de Kas 2015 at Looije Tomaten.
There we were with 100 screaming schoolchildren in the
corridor and Monique Smit who had to keep them all in
line. This busy opening was only the start of an even busier
weekend.
Although the weather was a factor in reducing attendance
on Saturday, Sunday was a different story. That’s when many
people thought, “Let’s take a look in the greenhouse”. And we
had a queue right up to the end of the car park. We almost had
to set up crowd control barriers and signs saying “From this
point, the waiting time is 20 minutes”.
Once people had made it through the long queue and climbed
the steep stairs at the entrance (“What steep stairs you have
here”), the next things we heard from our flabbergasted
visitors were “Ohhh, isn’t it beautiful”, “Do they have fresh
fruit here every day?” and “What a gorgeous view you have”.
For us, it was another nice reminder of the kind of wonderful
company we all work at.
Teddy & Dorine
We got to come and help out with Kom in de Kas on Sunday.
Before the visitors arrived, Willemijn gave us a short briefing
and we then quickly went to our stations for the day. It wasn’t
long before large groups of visitors came streaming in.
The weather forecast attracted many visitors, but this did mean
that is was very warm at our station in the greenhouse.
We had been told to expect around 15,000 visitors a day. We
don’t know the exact number, but they just kept on coming on
Sunday. All ages: from children running and jumping around
to older people tooting the horns on their motorised scooters
as they buzzed through the greenhouse.
The tomatoes we had put out for tasting went like hotcakes.
Some people even did the tour twice so they could get
seconds. A number of parents were happy that their children
were FINALLY enjoying eating vitamins! “Where can we buy
them???”
We were asked some interesting questions in the greenhouse.
Such as:
-Is there real honey in these tomatoes?
-How do you get the honey into the tomatoes?
-What kind of roots are hanging there? (They meant the plants
suspended in the support system.)
-What kind of plants are growing on the ground? (They meant
the leaves that we prune from the plants.)
-Is that plastic there all the time? (This was the plastic used to
protect the plants during the Kom in the Kas event.)
Several other questions were asked, of course, many of which
had already been answered in the videos they had seen, but
people wanted to know more about how long the plants would
become, why the pails of Virkon were hanging there, and how
long it took to harvest one path. And these were just a few
examples.
We thought it was a really great day - a day for sweating,
laughing and having lots of fun!
Spotlight on the process… lowering
What’s the reason behind lowering the tomato plants? What’s involved in this process? Cultivation specialist Erik van der Hoorn
tells us all about it in this edition of ‘Spotlight on the process’.
What does ‘lowering of the tomato plants’ mean, and why is
I’ve heard that lowering the plant also involves some risks.
this done?
What do you have to be extra careful about during the
‘Lowering’ involves letting the string supporting the tomato
lowering process?
plant drop a little by giving it a turn or half a turn, depending
The greatest risk is bumping into the trusses and dislodging
on the height of the high wire hook.
their tomatoes. What’s more, the tomatoes shouldn’t be
allowed to wind up in the bundle of stems or be too high
Tomato plants grow about 30 cm. in height every week. If we
for the harvesters to reach. After all, the tomatoes should be
didn’t lower the plants, their tops would reach such a height
harvested neatly and properly.
that they would be too close to the lamps. They would also
get too close to the high wire hooks from which they are
During the lowering process, it is important to pay close
suspended. When this happens, you can’t release any more
attention to the right distribution of the plant tops and to
string. Lowering also makes harvesting easier. Otherwise the
make sure that they are all at the same height.
tomatoes would be too high for the harvesters to reach.
Can anyone who works in the greenhouse engage in
How often do the plants have to be lowered?
lowering?
The plants have to be lowered weekly. Exactly how much this
No, lowering is a specialised task that not anyone is allowed to
is has to be determined every week.
do. Every greenhouse has its own team who does this.
Secretary’s Day
Secretary’s Day - the day when employers pay their secretaries extra
attention - is 18 April. This year, as in the past, Looije wanted to do its
bit to celebrate this special day.
We made our rounds armed with 16 gift parcels containing such
items as a cookbook, a bottle of prosecco, chocolate and cinema
tickets. Amongst the recipients were the secretaries serving the Mayor
of Westland, the secretaries at the MKB (small and medium-sized
businesses) Service Desk, and the secretaries at the VB Group. Also, we
couldn’t exclude our own Veronique in Burgerveen either.
Everyone was delighted with their parcel, so it was nice to see how
pleasantly surprised all the ladies were.
Enjoy the Taste
As everyone probably knows, we conducted a survey this March. All
employees were given the opportunity to use this survey to express their
opinions about various aspects of their daily work, communications at
Looije, and the events organised in our company. It was also the perfect
chance to provide ideas about things like how we could make Looije an
even better place to work.
Right now, the Enjoy the Taste group is still at work collating all of
the information that was collected. For each of Looije’s locations, the
first thing the group did was to count the responses (1 to 5) given for
each question and put those in an overview. But that was just the start.
The next step was to send all the answers to the open questions to a
professional translation agency since the questions had been replied to in
various languages. They had to be translated into Dutch in order to arrive
at a reliable analysis of the comments made by all the employees.
At this time, the Enjoy the Taste group has all the necessary data that has
been processed up until now for each location. A general summary will
be produced during a special meeting of the group on 13 May.
As soon as everything is ready, we will inform you of the results.
Best regards :-)
ColumnAnja Bottinga
It’s always fun to read the Tomato Talk. I’ve always admired
daughter (studying tourism) would like me to take her along
people who can sit down and whip out a piece of text without
so she can take pictures for me and see all the sights as well.
any trouble whatsoever. So when Niels sent me an e-mail
I’m going to take a camera even though my pictures usually
yesterday saying it was my turn, my first reaction was ‘No....
cut off my subjects’ heads or legs or aren’t in focus. (I’m now
not again!’ But it’s been almost a year since my last column, so
getting a crash course in photography!)
it was time to choose a topic.
I’ve also heard from colleagues that it’s a good idea to take
Someone else was already writing about Kom in de Kas, so
baby wipes, disinfectant wipes and diarrhoea medicine along
I decided on Kenya. I’ll be joining Michiel and Juan on the
because of what the toilets are like there. Motion sickness pills
next visit to the farmers who live near Cheptais in Kenya. I’ve
are no luxury item either considering the extremely bumpy
already heard a lot about the project from colleagues who
roads there. So my shopping list is all made up.
have been there already. The pictures in the corridor near the
cafeteria also give an impression of what it’s like there. I’m
Above all, of course, it will be the kind of experience I’ll
pretty proud of the fact that I will be representing Looije there,
remember for the rest of my life. It’s good, sometimes, to see
but I have to say that I find it all a bit scary as well.
how people on another continent live and how they manage to
be happy with the limited means available to them.
The tickets have been booked and I’ve had the vaccinations.
The malaria pills are also ready to take along. My preparations
We’ll be sure to let you know about our experiences. I’ll take
at home are in full swing. My oldest daughter works at
pictures so you can see for yourself if the crash course helped.
Bever Zwerfsport so she’s given me all kinds of advice about
travelling to Africa such as buying a vest with an antimosquito layer (which I have since purchased). My youngest
Kwa Heri
BIRTHDAYS
Michiel Hoogenboom
25-4
Jorn Baer
29-4
Arja Hilberdink
25-4
Michael van der Raad
30-4
Ilona Jonusauska
26-4
Frank Hoogeveen
5-5
Raivo Lasmanis
27-4
Piotr Lange
6-5
Norbert Ciepiela
28-4
Lasma Krastina
6-5
Katarzyna
Mark van der Wilt
7-5
Soboczynska-Paradowska 29-4
Elzbieta Kurdziel
7-5
What keeps you busy…
Kinga Wronska
Hi, my name is Kinga Wrońska and I’m 25 years old. In
forcing ourselves to work at such a pace that we’re making
October, I started renting a house in Schiedam with my
ourselves physically sick and mentally ill. It’s also creating
fantastic housemates. I’ve been working at Looije for two
hostilities among us.
years, recently as a line manager.
P.S.
... in your personal life?
I spend a lot of my time working and I’m also taking a Dutch
language course that I’m enjoying very much. In my spare
time, I’m busy with everyday things. I like to go out to the
bowling lanes, to roller skate and to drive.
... in your work?
As I mentioned before, I work as a line manager in the
packaging facility during the night shift. I’m responsible
for making sure that all the orders are filled according to
plan. I teach new women how they should cut so that the
work gets carried out quickly and properly.
... in the world?
I don’t want to talk about wars and airplane crashes, but
I’d like to say something about the general situation in the
world. Our pace of life is terrifying. We’re always chasing
after more and more money. It’s never enough. We’re
I’d like to say hello to Emilia Gryczkowska. Thank you!