Introducing: Sander Admiraal
Sander has worked at Garden Connect since 2013. He grew from an online marketeer to the manager of the online marketing department. In this blog, we’d like to introduce you to Sander!
As manager of the online marketing department, Sander works on developing all of the marketing services and he works to strengthen and expand the marketing team. In 2013, Sander started at Garden connect as an online marketeer. “My first impression was: there are 3 young entrepreneurs with a plan, and I want to be part of that. Meanwhile, they grew from 3 young entrepreneurs to 3 visionaries in the garden industry. I immediately liked the horizontal organisation structure and the accessibility. The communication between the owners and the team was very pleasant and there was a lot of trust in the team. “
From the music industry to the garden industry
Sander started his career in the music industry as an online marketeer. After that, he worked for an American publicity agency in Amsterdam. Especially his time in the music industry was very informative. “We were selling music worldwide, but the marketing was targeted for each country and continent. It was very interesting to work with specific strategies for different areas.” In 2013 Sander started working at Bratpack as an online marketeer. “At first, we were the online marketing department, just the two of us. The department itself and the services were relatively new to the company. I had my ideas about this, partly because of my experience at an American publicity agency. What I envisioned was a differentiated offer in services and the need to build a long term relationship with our clients. I grew more and more into this job and the ideas I had about online marketing, and from there I became a senior online marketeer. With the growth of the department eventually, I started focusing fully on the online marketing department of Garden Connect.”
Teambuilding
Sander is most proud of the fact that the online marketing team has been together for a long time. “We have kept a lot of mainstays of the online marketing department in the team, like Victoria and Barry. The staff turnover is low and I’m proud of the fact that we give everyone the responsibility to take the lead of their own success.” Besides that, Sander considers the services that Garden Connect offers to be very effective. Garden Centres really benefit from the services that we’ve developed and that makes Garden Connect a strong connection between the online customer and the physical garden centres. “I really enjoy seeing colleagues like Barry develop in the team. He started as an intern and if you look at where he is at now, it’s very nice to be involved.”
During his time off, Sander enjoys running or training in the gym. Besides that, he is a young dad of Melle who is just 9 months old. His most recent hobby is nature photography. When it comes to plants and nature, Sander’s personal favourites are the turmeric plant and the palm tree. The turmeric plant remains green and has a subtle flower which makes this Sander’s favourite houseplant. His pride in the backyard is the palm tree. “I see it growing every year and then I count how many new leaves have grown in the meantime.”
Vision for the future
“What I want to reach is that as an online marketing agency we create an even more stable name in the garden industry. We are well known in The Netherlands, Belgium and the United Kingdom, but I see a huge potential for growth in North America. There are a lot of garden centres that could use our help.” Besides that, Sander mentions the opportunities in the field of Artificial Intelligence and Augmented Reality. “The consumer gets used to using many types of apps and toolings. If we use the techniques that are out there, we can create more solutions and continue growing. In this way, we don’t only grow for the sake of growing, but we grow with the goal of helping more garden centres.”
