“The auction yielded no less than €350K more than expected!”
Jan van de Ven from Someren – Seller
Jan van de Ven (67) is ending the agricultural activities of his contracting and earthmoving company, Gebr. Van de Ven, after 45 years. The company was originally founded by his father in 1967.
“Last year, my brother, with whom I ran the business, passed away, and my children aren’t planning to take over. I then started thinking about the right time to stop. It all went very quickly because the agri-account manager, Stef, convinced me that I should sell in the spring, due to the mowing season. After all, no one is looking for mowing machines in the fall. And it worked really well, because there was a lot of competitive bidding!”
“When I decided to sell my company, I didn’t hesitate for a moment: I wanted to do it through Troostwijk. Troostwijk has a very good reputation and attracts buyers from all over Europe. I didn’t even consider other auction platforms. I thought: that wouldn’t work out anyway. The big advantage of auctioning through Troostwijk is that you can not only offer your machines, but also all kinds of other goods. That’s how I ended up with over 500 lots!”
Support from Troostwijk Staff
A year ago, account manager Stef Hooijman visited Jan to do an appraisal.
“I initially wanted to see if I could sell everything at once, including the company itself, but that didn’t work out. Then I chose to auction everything. Site managers from Troostwijk came by, taking a lot of the workload off my hands by numbering, photographing, and putting everything online.”
Progress of the Auction
The auction went beyond all expectations. Apart from a few old tires, everything was sold. Jan was extremely pleased with the outcome.
The result was fantastic; the auction yielded no less than €350,000 more than expected!
Lots Going Abroad
The pickup day also went very well.
Jan:
“It was very busy and a bit chaotic, but the Troostwijk staff remained very calm. What surprised me was the number of lots that went abroad—even small items like tires. Many foreign buyers come with a van and just load everything up on the pickup day.”
No Black Hole
Jan isn’t afraid of falling into a ‘black hole’ now that his company has been sold:
“I’ve always worked very hard and we rarely took vacations. I never really felt the need for it, but now it’s different. Next year, we want to take a beautiful long trip.
We’ve also bought land to build a bungalow.
Besides that, I’m not planning to sit still completely; I’ll continue doing specification support one day a week through a sole proprietorship I’ve set up.
Now that the auction has been successfully completed, I can focus on a new phase in my life.”