#teamretail
#teamretail is de inspiratiepodcast van Wave of Engagement, designstudio opgericht door #teamretail-host Tim Gielen. Elke eerste dinsdag van de maand een nieuwe podcast.
Bij Wave of Engagement bedenken en ontwerpen we de belevingsruimtes van morgen, voor ondernemers en ondernemende bedrijven in retail, showroom & hospitality.
#teamretail
Den Brillenman, een leven lang levens veranderen door impactvol te ondernemen met Koen Van Pottelbergh #58
Vandaag aan de microfoon, Koen van Pottelberg een visionaire ondernemer in de optiekwereld. Koen deelt met ons zijn inspirerende reis, van het opbouwen van een horeca-imperium (Bell's Cafés en Café Local) tot het leiden van een bloeiende optiekzaak, De Brilleman, en het oprichten van Refaced, een innovatieve circulaire brillenwinkel. Daarnaast spreekt hij over zijn betrokkenheid bij levensveranderende projecten zoals Eyes for the World en Eyes for Belgium, gericht op het verbeteren van het zicht wereldwijd.
Hij deelt openhartig over zijn persoonlijke worstelingen, inclusief zijn herstel na een ongeval waarbij hij later toegaf dat het een zelfmoordpoging was. Ook bespreekt hij zijn bijdrage aan innovaties in symmetrische brillentechnologieën, samenwerkingen met de Rode Duivels én een ontmoeting met de koningin. Koen's verhaal belicht herstel, innovatie en sociale impact, en onderstreept de uitdagingen van inefficiënte brildonatieprogramma's, waarvoor hij een duurzamer, circulair model voor oogzorg heeft ontwikkeld.
Deze aflevering biedt diepgaande inzichten in ondernemerschap, de balans tussen succes en falen, en benadrukt het belang van communicatie en samenwerking om zowel lokaal als wereldwijd een verschil te maken.
In deze podcast gaan we in gesprek met eigenzinnige retailerondernemers die zich met hun unieke visie weten onderscheiden in hun branche.
Dat doen we om onze brede community van retailers en retailondernemers, #teamretail, te inspireren positief naar de toekomst te kijken.
De podcast wordt gehost door Tim Gielen, oprichter van design studio Wave of Engagement die de winkel, showroom & hospitalityconcepten van morgen bedenken en ontwerpen.
Heb je plannen, ideeën die je wil uitwerken contacteer ons dan op tim@waveofengagement.com
Sponsor: https://solutions.dobit.com/
Team Retail. Welcome to episode 58 of the Team Retail podcast. I'm your host, tim Gielen, founder of design studio. Wave of Engagement.
Speaker 2:At Wave.
Speaker 1:We design and design the concepts, the interior and the technology for the living spaces of tomorrow in Retail, showroom and Hospitality. In this podcast, we're going to talk to self-sufficient entrepreneurs to inspire other entrepreneurs with their stories and insights. That way, we can make a difference together. Today, on our microphone, koen van Pottelmink, better known as the glasses man. Koen's story is like a book. He was a successful entrepreneur in the world of the nightlife.
Speaker 2:I started with a glasses shop and then in 1992, the Bels Café. Maybe people who knew Bels thought it was a huge success.
Speaker 1:But we had to fight for that success After a life-changing accident life took a new turn.
Speaker 2:Maybe I got the second chance to talk about life and also about death. Enjoy life Today. I make every day an adventure.
Speaker 1:Today we know him as a pioneer in the circular and social sector. Behind ReFaced, the first circular glasses store that has recently opened.
Speaker 2:In the circular hub circuit here in Antwerp, every glasses holder has glasses in his drawer. Let's take the glasses out and let's clean the glasses. And that's how I started, a little after corona, to collect glasses and see what's going on.
Speaker 1:He is also the driving force behind Eyes for the World and Eyes for Belgium, a project with the mission of giving everyone the chance to look up. More than 400,000 people have already been helped in this way to have a better view on life.
Speaker 2:My challenge was to show children better, with the goal of making them see better, to make them study better, to get a higher job, to get them out of poverty. So I need 20 euros to make a glasses, the logistics eye test and put his face on a child's face.
Speaker 1:He has been active as an entrepreneur for 34 years and started 34 projects at that time In one way or another. All those projects, from his first catering business to his Mechelse store De Brilleman, are connected to each other through his story, his view of the world In recent years, the red thread in that story is becoming more and more clear, Making impact. Very happy that we have this impact entrepreneur on the floor today. Also very curious about your story, Koen. Welcome, Welcome.
Speaker 2:Good morning Tim. Thank you for the invitation and the introduction.
Speaker 1:Yes, very'm very happy to do that. It's nice. We were just looking at the things you did in your career. At some point we thought we wouldn't be able to go over them individually, Because then we would make a marathon out of it. But there is a nice red thread in it. That's very clear and I think it's nice for the people to go into your head, go into your story.
Speaker 2:That's not easy.
Speaker 1:No, I'm going to do my utmost to crawl into that undertaking idea machine and listen together. I'll tell you in the intro. You actually started in the hospitality industry.
Speaker 2:Yes, not really. So I started in the optics business. In 1990 I started my first business in Boom. My dad is also an optics specialist. He was in Bornem, but I was the son of a doctor. It was a difficult job for me with all due respect to my dad, to go through life as the son of a doctor. I worked in the shop for six months, even for a little money. They asked my father because he was already used to it for more than 30 years and he said to me dad, this is nothing for me, I would like to start my own business. And then I got the chance in 1990 to start the Opti Gallery. It was one of the first stores that effectively started with branding. It was one of the first labels and that inspired me. It came mainly from Italy. Luxottica was that then. They still exist.
Speaker 1:They are the largest brand in the world.
Speaker 2:Because I also worked there before my army service at Spheroflix. It was a very classic collection then, but I was triggered by the fashion world, the branding, and there were very few opticians who were focused on that. And then I have Optic Gallery, which was actually the first store where the shop was located. It was a kind of gallery where people came in to look at the shop. That was also quite new. My design was how should I put it? It had a motto. It had everything that wasn't directly related to the classic glasses shops we knew back then and for me Boom was an ideal location.
Speaker 2:I got customers from Antwerp to Boom, from Brussels to Boom and in Bornem where my dad was, that was the big church tower around that church tower and for me a tree was a step further. But because the Van Pottenbergs are all in the optics world, so my dad is an optician, his brothers, his children, the grandchildren. So we are a dozen opticians in that family. But my grandfather next to my mother was a beer smoker. My parents are from the period of Trian and Bodegem-Tegenhalst and I was also brought up with him as a child at the tog and the tog story was always, always inspiring for me the conversations, the quarrels, the discussions, the stories, and I always found that intriguing, even as a student. I was a student for two years and a year as a student, so I had a nice student life in Brussels.
Speaker 2:I've seen that anyway. Yes, you know, watch out. We were with 80% of the ladies, who all let themselves be duped because they knew I wasn't going far. So it could have been taken differently at the time. Because you have to show respect for each other. You are fellow students, you might later become colleagues, so never forget't forget that. So that was a nice time and I always wanted to have a student café, but of course I didn't get any green light from home. But when I got that chance and that was in the early 90's, where it was all taverns and I thought the problem with a tavern was that, and the problem, I thought, with a tavern, everyone was in their corners. The roof was almost no longer used. The brown bar was not hip at that time. That has now all changed. So the youth did not really go there and you were actually in a gap between ten hours and one hour.
Speaker 2:Ten hours you ate there and then and then 1 hour before bedtime and to fill that gap for the comrades I always say I had a concept in my head where the target was central. That was very important to me. The target had to be in the middle, but isn't it?
Speaker 1:the target that's in the middle, but isn't the tower actually in the middle? Is it the conversation? Yes, of course it's the meeting place.
Speaker 2:But there's also a reason why the tower isn't always in the middle it's the logistics, the walkways, the logistics. Most of the time a tower is against a wall because there's a place for the stick.
Speaker 2:And so on, and the stock and so on, and I thought we're going to do it differently, that logistics releases itself, and that was actually a part it's not just that a part of the success of Belscafé. It was also a bit the name. Belscafé was Belgium, it was in there, belpils because we worked together with the brewery Moordgat, because that's also in our region, so that was also a story. Maybe people who knew the Bels thought it was a huge success, but we had to fight for that success.
Speaker 1:It didn't go well. The doors didn't open the first six months.
Speaker 2:People didn't understand the concept Because they couldn't really eat there only a sandwich, but for the rest we were also with music, with DJ's and some dance cafes the first dance cafes but in the beginning they didn't get along. So we had to do something creative and we succeeded, and that was with a fashion show in the Carré that's a nice anecdote with Jean-Pierre, the founder of the Carré.
Speaker 1:For our Dutch listeners. That's a well-known disco in Willebroek.
Speaker 2:Yes, it still exists. It's always on a high level after so many years. Respect for those people that it's still there. And there was a fashion show, together with a friend of the Brul and I with the glasses and I thought the Carré is closed. After the fashion show I share a cocktail for free, a Bels cocktail. 90% of the audience in the Carré were ladies, so I said if they all come to drink a cocktail, the Bels is full and is there ambiance. And I said to the footballers, because I come from the football world, I said, guys, it's the moment, come to the.
Speaker 1:Bels, it's going to be fun, so I have a surprise.
Speaker 2:And after that fashion show there was a discussion point with Jean-Pierre and that went around like a fire and everyone went to the Bels after that fashion show and that was a Thursday and that was actually the first successful Thursday. And it stayed that way Thursday, friday, saturday With the advantage that people first came to us and then traveled to the Carré or stayed with us. So we strengthened each other a bit.
Speaker 1:And with. Jean-pierre, we always had the most respect for each other in those times you open your glasses case, you put it down a bit more like a gallery, more fashion, more experience. In parallel you say for the friends, I have an idea. Then in the middle, At that moment, did you have those two pots on? Were you in the shop one day and in the cafe in the evening? Those were tough times.
Speaker 2:I started in 1990 with a glasses shop and then in 1992 the Belscafé. That was seven on seven.
Speaker 1:Day and night.
Speaker 2:But yes, that's the young man. Eventually you can get into trouble. The advantage as an optician is that it's not really a heavy, heavy job, so it's actually a nice, proper job and the nightlife started that way. But I could have done it you could have done it.
Speaker 1:Yes, you know, I didn't start with the Belsen.
Speaker 2:I started with a friend, Rudy de Wachter, Really a cafe man when we could find each other. We were in school for 10 years. Rudy was 10 years older. That worked. Yes, that was a success formula. You didn't keep it together, I think, no. No. The second one didn't come straight from me because I already had enough in my head, but Rudy was also an entrepreneur. The sky is not the limit. We got the opportunity to visit the star in the Waasland, in Sine Claes, the road to Beveren. We also had a coffee shop with a organ. We also have to look at the past, because the Carré was also a bus café with a organ. Those were very strong points, so buses stopped there. So that had a past and people knew those places to be.
Speaker 2:They were often the dance cafes, the tea dance cafes from the past, yes, from the past and those were very strong strategic locations and still always they are still quite strategic positions and we took that chance to do a bit of the Thank God it's Friday concept, but still a bit in our own story, because in the end you're Einstein, you don't find anything new. I'm someone who watches a lot, who takes a lot, but still wants to write my own story in it. Not copycats I don't believe in copycats Because then you actually lose yourself, excluding the confirmed rule, of course. But the Bells story, yes, we put everything against the wall. We created it ourselves. That was who we were at that moment. It was a huge success, a success in the end. But it was also a restaurant. It was a more complex story, it was a bigger challenge, but we were very proud that the story was there. At that moment we also got a little insight into the world of the restaurant.
Speaker 2:We were also one of the first to, together with the Carré and then the Volmolen in Lierich a disco where we were fully automated, so tap tapers were automated, we knew perfectly how many pins had been tapped, so that was extremely demanding. So it was also interesting to be there as one of the first to be there.
Speaker 1:And Koen. Are you then an entrepreneur? Who on the entrepreneur, who has the creative side? I think you see an opportunity from the story of Brulle and Bels. You give it your own filling, your own colour, your own creativity On the other hand, I hear the cranes were automated.
Speaker 2:It's innovative and forward-looking, but it's very much in the operational and margin-making and trying to be a double, which is very much in the operational and margin trying negative mark. It was also a risk. I didn't really stand by it. I jumped, I wanted to do it. It was in my head and I do it. But I also wanted to show that you as a horeca entrepreneur could work in a professional way. You had to work to survive, to make a difference. So we were also in a group with the Van Wonterghems, the owners of the Carré and a lot of other businesses in West Flanders. They also took it very professionally. So we were also contacted for example, we were actually the pioneers of the Bob campaign In collaboration with the police and the state guards, to see what their standpoints were. How can we find each other in this, also in drug policy? So I found it very important to be recognized behind the scenes in a professional way. Of course the modality is not silent about that.
Speaker 2:I also got a lot of respect for hospitality entrepreneurs Because everybody thinks, oh, hospitality, hospitality, just do it.
Speaker 1:I already gave away something about that last time but I have a hospitality background or a family of hospitality. My mother has five hospitality businesses in Lierse, my brother one. So I grew up in itierse, my brother 1. So I grew up in it. To put it that way, it's a very hard style and if you don't professionalize it you can't make money. Yes, you know, it gets more and more difficult.
Speaker 2:We still have a golden time, of course. In the past we looked at the golden time, but for us it wasn't the golden age either. There is never that feeling when you undertake is that a golden age. It is then judged afterwards ah yes, that was a golden age.
Speaker 1:The 60's was a golden age.
Speaker 2:My dad had a time without BTW, but that was different Crackers. Every generation has its own cracker blocks, its own competition and how to deal with it. So that is from all times. Every generation has its own. Because then Café Local came, I had the opportunity to go to Brazil for the first time For footballers, and I came back a bit disheartened In that sense because I thought it was more human trafficking for myself. That wasn't my thing.
Speaker 1:You didn't scout because you lost your job. Football was something I understood in life.
Speaker 2:I'm a football fanatic. I was connected to FC Boom in the second grade. They wanted to scout players. I'm not the greatest kid, but you do feel that game. I went along, I got the chance, I found it interesting and exciting, but I was disgusted by it.
Speaker 2:The fun thing was we met two brothers there who all had a business in the area of Interlagos, where the formula is at the sea. They had one street. They were owners of all those streets, were owners of all those streets it's a coincidence we're not in life, I always say. And those guys were looking for a European disco. So they came across us and Nefain and Babbel came to Belgium. We also talked about the automation and we went back to Ginder. So we connected there and almost took that step to set up a club in Interlagos. I came back and my roommate said Koen, I found an incredible building in Antwerp. Come on, take the NATO, we're going to take a look. That was the paradox. If you go into that building, you immediately fall in love with it. And then I say let's just leave Brazil, like that we're going to bring it here.
Speaker 2:And we built that paradox to Café Local.
Speaker 1:A legendary club right.
Speaker 2:Yes, you know, I'm still proud of it Because it was also a different level. It was one of the first clubs where you could experience three different music stories Live in the Mercado, the ballroom, international dance music and, above all, r&b man. That was insane, a bit like the Cuba story, because the building was leaning towards it. They took out the ceiling to bring the atmosphere from above down. That was the sum of the starting life, I think.
Speaker 1:I think that's yes. I'm still happy that the name Café Local. I think it's a very good example of the way it started. I think he's right.
Speaker 2:I'm still happy that the name Café L'Occal still exists. Unfortunately, the ballroom has remained intact, but even the neon, the ballroom we placed there. So, yes, it does something.
Speaker 1:And so yes, we're talking about a period. We went from 1990 to 1992, I don't know where we are now approximately in the timeline, I think it was 1995. Well, look, so actually we had already said it in the intro 34 years, 34 projects. That was at that moment a bit the peak of what you were doing with Horecaan at the time. Yes, and was the glasses store still there. Yes, it was still there.
Speaker 2:So my optics business is still there. Of course, I also had a co-worker At that time, because I no longer worked with that company at a certain point. We worked with 400 people, so I got a little bit of a gray hair, because you also work 7-on-7, 24-on-24.
Speaker 2:So also different times. You can't compare that anymore. But that was the highlight of our story. We wanted everyone to work with us. We launched Corona, red Bull, everything was hot. And then, even though my dad and my mom always told me to keep my feet on the ground and I still thought I'm still on my feet on the ground, but if I look back through the glasses I'm wearing now, I was also a bit Swimming. Yes, yes, yes, you know.
Speaker 1:If everyone has lost their success.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, you know, there are pros and cons. I always have in my life. I always want to do good for everyone, but you can't do good for everyone. So you have people who like you and you have people who don't support your story, and at that moment, we also made mistakes. In this way, we started to share gifts, so to speak, with each other. One of my partners had a dream to have the Fouquet in control.
Speaker 1:We took it over the Fouquet here at the Keizerlei.
Speaker 2:A very well-known thing for that period. But of course on the way back, keizerlei was also on the way back a bit in that period, but I knew him as a young guy.
Speaker 1:The Bommelde, but I knew him as a young guy, the Bobbe.
Speaker 2:The Jimmies. That was the place you weren't allowed in. There. It was very exclusive. I knew the gatekeeper and the funny thing is this gatekeeper became the main gatekeeper of Café L'Ocal Because he knew the city people. Because, he knew the underground. That was not a fighter's gate.
Speaker 1:It was a human gate.
Speaker 2:A human gate and that is the class that you also have to try to realize with a business. And then we took that over for a symbolic Frank. But the millions that was still in Belgian francs who fell out of the closet there was immense. And there was another story of Interblue which had nothing to do with murder, so that was a difficult puzzle.
Speaker 1:And you talked about a gift, so you wanted to.
Speaker 2:Yes, one of my friends I started with. That was his dream and we were in the possibilities to do something extra.
Speaker 1:Everything was possible at that moment exactly.
Speaker 2:Yes, but we weren no longer thinking about it, although I'm happy about that. We were with four friends because Brauwerij Moordgaard bought in with us. I had registered the name Bels Café and then a new generation came, mr Michel and his brothers. They say, koen, that Bels is our name. I say, no, that's our name. We started negotiating and we were worthy partners, so we also bought that building. That was a heavy investment. To give you an example, we needed 5 million to start with our first Bels and we went to the local bank, kbc, and the door remained closed when they heard that Brouwer Boertgaat was on board we were invited with champagne.
Speaker 2:And to amuse me, I said to the bank manager we actually need 100 million, Is that?
Speaker 1:possible? Oh yes, we don't have a single problem.
Speaker 2:I said do you mean that now we could have asked for 5 million, 5 years?
Speaker 1:ago to put a tray on it years ago, but it didn't work.
Speaker 2:Now it's 100 million. Very difficult for me.
Speaker 1:I found that very and that also shows in what you were trying to say. I started to float like that because suddenly things that were not possible for Dini became possible and people start behaving differently to help lift that success. Of course, that's always the case.
Speaker 2:The dollar signs started to spark in everyone's eyes. It's also a learning process, of course. So yes, watch out. That was with tooters and bells that the Fouquet went open here. Even with an elephant from the zoo, people were waiting. I have to say in what grand door People were brought with the limo, the big limos, from Café Local to Fouquet and brought back. So, yes, it was a bit, but the problem was that our profits were all worn out, worn out. So, yes, and I'm glad that I, actually we were four members.
Speaker 1:I said to myself.
Speaker 2:no, I'm not behind it. Why I never felt at home in the Fouquet? It wasn't ours, it was from the city, it was a city business, but it wasn't the Bells Boys, the Rambrakiet.
Speaker 1:A bit of not being true to your DNA.
Speaker 2:Yes, that DNA was not there, fouquet was from the Bruno's era, so that was referred to another person who was different in life than I was.
Speaker 2:But it happened, we had learned from it but then we went to another recado, to another friend, the water mill in Temsen, and then something happened. I was invited by a journalist of the latest news. Jan Toij was there. He was the then CEO of Brauwerij Palm and he was interested in our group. And at that moment I also reported that to a friend and said okay, let's sit together and we'll be together between Christmas and New Year. If you sit together between Christmas and New Year, then something is happening.
Speaker 2:And what was on the table? The first café in New York, still in the market in all provinces, both in Flanders and Wallonia, belgian cafés and also in the Netherlands, because Palm was very much also in the Netherlands, because Palm was very much present in the Netherlands. And there was also a connection with Steendonk, steenuffel, preehendonk, so a white beer that was brewed together. And we, with our problems, had everything beautifully bloomed behind the scenes. And on January, january, I got a fax that was still more criminal than our own proposal, so that man was really interested in actually having 20% of the share, so that we would become five companions, and I said stop it here for me. And we said, in a correct way, I then unloaded the ship because we can still go through the same door. So that's also nice, because he's now married to a colleague of mine from Boom, an optician. So that's nice too, because he's now married to a colleague of mine from Boom an optician, so that's great.
Speaker 2:But anyway, that's a choice, his choice, and I made my choice and I sold everything. I was lucky. Of course, everything was on the table. The values were on the table, the values of Paul. So my puzzle was made very easily and the brewery Moordgaard was in custody for the payments. And that was a difficult one, because you sell your child, the child you created. What value is there against it? Actually, there is no value against it. There is no money against it, against your child. The child won't sell it. But sometimes in business it's a different way. I did that and honestly I fell into a very dark pit.
Speaker 1:A lot of money and a lot of time.
Speaker 2:You know you're looked at differently. You're not looked at as a creative catering entrepreneur anymore. You're looked at as someone who has money. If you go to the catering exchange in Ghent, we were clung to by everyone. Now I walk around and nobody still says anything about me. Stranger, yes, very difficult, I can't describe it.
Speaker 1:It's like an identity crisis.
Speaker 2:Yes, I still had my optics business that's my roots but everything fell away, also the feeling you come to that then you have to move on as a customer. I'm now very black and white. I never, really had to wait. As a customer, I understand what you mean. But you were looked at differently and then I actually wanted to escape, so to speak.
Speaker 2:One of my friends said you have to go to the Seychelles. There are opportunities there. Come, let's go there together. I've been there three or four times. We wanted to start a spa in Mahé. I'm talking about 25 years ago and that wasn't there yet. There were a lot of possibilities. We also saw that Arabians came to the Seychelles. There was a lot of money. We almost had a deal with Plantation Club, a nice hotel, to make a spare room for the people, to offer them something more luxurious. My former wife had a job already because I was in the round table and there is also a round table Directly connected with people who lived there and I came back to the 4th time to take my suitcase to get there for a year and the market that had a very serious car accident at the shop in the Brille shop. I had to make a choice.
Speaker 2:Stop at the Brille shop sell. Go to the Seychelles completely. You say shops, did you have?
Speaker 1:more options.
Speaker 2:No shops, sell shops or go to the socials or keep your shop. And I did that, and that was also, of course, yes, looking back, maybe the right choice, because in the end, you never lose your roots. But then I felt like working with 400 people, back alone, back in my shop, between my four walls. The shop was pretty big and happy, but that was not my thing anymore. I didn't feel I missed something here. And then, through the travels, I I did a stopover in Singapore, discovered the Raffles and there I got the idea of the afternoon English.
Speaker 1:The Raffles is a legendary beautiful hotel in Singapore. Very colonial, very Beautifully designed.
Speaker 2:And then I went looking for a building here in Antwerp to start a story, a new concept, actually A new concept. I wanted Delray, but something else. The patisserie, high-end, high-end, with piano music First floor, then a complete cigar bar With whiskeys and cognac and all that, the cinema. So I find this is a building I know the owner pretty well, but over-invested and actually not aware enough, because in the story of the Bels company I was just a part of it.
Speaker 2:I was the creative guy. I had the most contact with the personnel, the human resource, before the letter, so to speak. But the logistics was more of a friend of mine. The administration was done by the bookkeeper, who was also a friend, and the supplier was the brewery. So that was a good puzzle. But now I was standing there alone. Then you were all pets at once.
Speaker 2:That is, of course, a much more complex story and I underestimated that a bit. I had two people in service service who were running it and something happened between those two and I saw everything disappear. My dream was fading away. I saw got the money, I saw it disappear. So it was a very difficult time. I've always been in a game. I like to win. As a footballer, I like to win. As an entrepreneur, I like to win. At that time I didn't lose much either. Well, once with football and once with games. But I wasn't a gambler either. Gambling casinos and playing cards for money. That wasn't for me.
Speaker 1:But I think at that moment you were still in a phase in your life where if you touched it and wanted it, it would be fine.
Speaker 2:The biggest problem is when you start thinking about it if you touch something and you think it's going to be gold you have a problem that was for the moment. Yes, indeed, touching everything weak was also a success, although we also had some setbacks after that, but still too little for myself, because I looked at the jackpots afterwards.
Speaker 2:Won the picture story because because it all fell into place and I felt the burden hanging and I thought how do I solve this? And no one talked about it. That's a big mistake, of course, when you're talking to someone, and the only solution I saw in that little pile and then it's just not thinking about the human side anymore, but just the financial side was to make sure I was gone and the insurance companies paid everything out.
Speaker 2:I had the image that my former wife was going to be happy my parents, my entourage A bit yes, bad that I have to say it something like James Dean, with the Porsche, boom gone, drive hard and you are. Yes, they will remember you in that way. That was in my head. I put it in a scene so that it didn't turn out to be a suicide.
Speaker 1:I didn't want to hurt my entourage. Your son turned his back on me, but you thought that if I would release the insurance and my financial debt and no one has to become the victim of that. That's right.
Speaker 2:That's very intense. I knew the day I was going to do it. I knew how I was going to do it. I was driving a car to the point where I was going to do it, but there were other cars. I didn't want to involve anyone, so I drove around completely and then gave the start again. So it was actually given twice and then, the second time, on my steering wheel, bang against the pillar of a bridge, with all the consequences. But in my scenario it was not that I woke up again. So I'm going to. I actually have it for a very long time as an accident bloomed, but I can no longer live with those lies. In the last few years and I also have it because of the fact that a journalist had contacted me it was 25 years ago about my accident I thought this might be the moment to eat. It was also a burden on my shoulders and also the reason why I got that second chance, Because it's also about why People also have the same thing.
Speaker 2:If someone commits suicide, why did he or she do it? Because it's hard to get an answer to that. I always think accept it. It has been your own choice. Is that the best choice? No, in my story certainly not. Shame on me, but you're so deep and with that I want to give a signal to people who are trying to communicate in a difficult period, to talk, to seek help. But that help is sometimes a little more difficult. Every time there is a suicide there is a phone call. That is a step further. So I hope that when people hear or read the story they will think about it, that we shouldn't let it get that far because it's not worth it. What you cause is very bad and the people you leave behind and is your problem solved?
Speaker 2:No, you don't solve the problem by doing that. You can solve the problem by taking it and sometimes you don't see the solution. But there is always a solution, of course, when you are sick, and sometimes there is no solution. But there are other ways euthanasia, the happiness that exists to say goodbye in a dignified way, also with your family and friends. But suicide is very cruel. It is very cruel.
Speaker 1:It is unlikely, koen. It is also difficult, I think, even though you have already come out of it, to bring it and tell it that you I'm not going to go into your head, but we often hear the success stories of entrepreneurs. We also just heard a few beautiful success stories from you that somewhere, yes, it is a part of your identity, that company and that also a part of your image, and everything is greatly influenced by the highs and lows and the fact that you, I think, have known that extreme height, from being thrown off in a certain sector to the point where you can't do anything. That feeling of I can't do it. I'm actually the imposter syndrome, I was just lucky, or whatever. I don't want to get into your head, but that it can get you so far in a pit that you almost in a rational way as I can hear you I've been around twice that you almost tried to find a rational solution for what?
Speaker 2:in essence, I'm not really a rational thinker.
Speaker 1:No, what in essence? Very often as an entrepreneur.
Speaker 2:I'm very impulsive, creative, but then yes, because I yes, that part of you was.
Speaker 1:I think the creative solutions were a bit out of the question. I think I may say so.
Speaker 2:Yes and be careful. These are cross-points. I don't want to cost them, because people who come across that not just entrepreneurs, but people in life that you really don't see it anymore, that you don't see a solution anymore. But and that's the message that Google talks about, talks about for every it, talk about it. For every problem there is a solution, no matter how difficult the problem is, and that you think about it. I said if I can bring one person to another thought, then that mission is already accomplished. Am I proud of what I've done? But not at all. You can't be proud of that. You can't, but I have to. For me, it was also why do I get that valuable second chance? I have consciously driven against a wall, against 42, maximum speed, boom. Why do I get that job? I have a normal life, I have a child on the world. Why?
Speaker 1:Why do I?
Speaker 2:get that opportunity and then we try to compensate with Eyes for the World, but is that the reason why I actually got that second chance? I thought about that a lot. Did you find an answer to that?
Speaker 1:for yourself.
Speaker 2:Well, actually, this is the answer for me, now that I say maybe I got that second, have the second chance to talk about life and also about death, suicide, and that is the biggest message I have to give To make people aware of enjoying life. Today, I make an day an adventure. Everything always runs as it should no way. Everyone has the wave movement in their life. But that is the main reason for me, because you have higher powers. What is a higher power? I also had a conversation with my grandfather during my coma, while I never met my grandfather. So, yes, that near-death experience, I experienced that in my own way. Everyone experiences that in their own way, but I am glad they allowed me to come back. I enjoy that every day. Every day I open my eyes. I only have one eye left because of that accident. That works. I'm a happy guy. I love it.
Speaker 1:You have that energy, because I can imagine that was a process. You have your coma, you have it waking up a very intense period.
Speaker 1:I can imagine afterwards. Where did the energy or the click come from that you went back into your strength and creativity, because your strength is, I think, to move things in the company. If we just look at the front and if we look at what you've accomplished after that, then you've created an enormously creative, energetic entrepreneur. Where did that click come from that you found that energy back and that you started doing projects like Eyes for the World, which make an enormous impact for a lot of people.
Speaker 2:You know, that click came pretty quickly, very bizarre. Of course you wake up. I was in coma for a month. That was for me what was sitting here? I was lying here, yes, of course, with all the misery of that, but I also didn't have anyone next to me I could talk about, so I missed that. And so during that then I stayed on intensive care for another three weeks. I think that I stayed there after 4 for a few weeks.
Speaker 2:After the Mount Koma, kevin was 6 or 7 years old, completely paralyzed. He was on intensive 4 and we went to the revalidation together. I compared Kevin to Keanu Reeves, who fell from his horse, completely paralyzed, breathless, and he sang all day about Kabouter Plop. I am Kabouter Plop. And he breathed again, always with a snort but with a smile, until his ears Not normal and I thought how is that possible? I was talking about this with the people who treated me the kinesiast and the osteopath. I said how is that possible, tom? How is that possible? He said every day, you will see, every day he sings about Kabaater Plop. And I thought, if this guy can do that, knowing that he can't get up anymore, I knew that if I worked on it it would have been a long breath. I could lead an acceptable life again. I did a D-Click mentally. Everything is in our ears, everything is mentally. It's the key to want to get back to the beginning and I did a declic. Until today, kevin is still with me in my bedroom.
Speaker 2:He died six months after that, but he was my saviour angel, who gave me the insight that life is still worth the effort, even if it's completely wasted. And of course, it took time because I had to revalidate for two more years in total and then it started to burn again in my head. I got a second chance. Life didn't always just go by so fast because I had a divorce. My wife knew that I had done that. She had a hard time with it. She also experienced a things during that period. We grew apart, but then I recovered. I started a contact lens center. So, yes, good, start doing business again and also solved the problems because eventually they were still there, of course.
Speaker 2:Yes, in the square they were doubled. So I stayed in the clinic for six months. So, yes, they don't solve themselves. So I took them all step by step and I got through it, so without actually getting a negative faillissement to get on it. No, everyone pays for it. But of course we lived in a villa, sold that villa, then sold that business here. Yes, good, we have to take a distance and go back to basics.
Speaker 1:And also talk to people for solutions. Try to find solutions. Of course, especially to how do we deal with this?
Speaker 2:You come from a period where you also focused on yourself to improve. I had a part in it, a competition on behalf of myself. And to want to move forward and to and to accept the maximum. I have a few shortcomings. I am 65% declared invalid, but I don't want to admit it. There are people who are declared invalid or not, who are much worse than me, so I never wanted to give it to them.
Speaker 1:And where did Eyes of the World come from?
Speaker 2:That's the compensation. Why should I come back? What can I do to get that gratitude, that humility, but also the gratitude of get that second chance? Why I don't get an answer to that?
Speaker 2:And then at a certain moment, via Scheier and De Schipping in the first season that was 15 years ago, at the end of the episodes episodes, there was always a inventor and my nickname was a bit Silvermane, with my friends, and at a certain moment a professor comes in Silver and he starts telling I thought he's talking about glasses and effective. So a man had developed a glasses based on a liquid Fluid Fluid To turn it around, it changes its strength. And then we contacted him via the people of Scheirelen, the ship. We contacted him, we sat together in Oxford and that glasses he developed was actually a very heavy instrument. I also say, joshua, the first thing someone wears in a glasses, glasses is the glasses. The last thing we wear is the glasses. Then it has to be more comfortable.
Speaker 2:We actually took part in the design of that glasses and that's how Eyes for the World was born, and then by Luc Beaucourt, who was the spooter of 2ZA, because I think I spent more than an hour in that ward. They didn't let me out. Luc Beaucoup was also there. We got to know each other in the clinic. It was a click with him and then we contacted him. We were working on a case and he was very connected with Miamar and then we got the chance to present that project in TUZ. So we got some press, luc was also a figure who regularly appeared in the media.
Speaker 2:So, yes, he was an ideal spokesman and that's how it started and it grew and grew and we were lucky to have the Social Project of the Red Doves for the World During the 2K in Brazil.
Speaker 1:If you're a football fanatic, and Brazil is the mecca of football. It also comes from a few foot circle moments. That's crazy.
Speaker 2:Mecca of football it does come from a few foot-circle moments. That's insane, of course. And my task was to start projects in the first phase of the matches in Sao Paulo, belo Horizonte and Rio. And the fun part was, because Brazil is a very large country, it was still quite far from being overrun. The players stayed in Sao Paulo, so I stayed close to Sao Paulo. Then I went to Belo Horizonte because that's where the match was. Belo Horizonte is the root of ophthalmology in South America, so that is also the first eye clinic and it is built on a hill with the idea that if we operate on someone and he looks outside, he has a view of the Belo Horizonte, so towards the city. So that was also a fantastic contact that we built on that. And then I got the message from the royal house that the queen was going to meet me, and so I met the queen in Rio and that was fantastic momentum Of course, a lot of cameras so that's an impact A lot of safety.
Speaker 2:You get some lessons in advance, what you can and what you can't. But I had a huge connection with Our Majesty. On the one hand, her father and my father were in the same class In a time in Lopem, so we were directly connected. The Red Devils, out of respect for each other, speak four words of French, three words of Dutch, or the other way around, to find each other. So I practiced that too to Majestad, because I'm always a proud Belgian. But she said no, you're from Flemish, let's just speak Flemish. It was an enormous match. And they put on their glasses and said come on, the discipline of the future. And I thought well, there's international press there. A lot of doors opened. One anecdote In my enthusiasm, because in the end that was a great bubble.
Speaker 2:I asked her look, majesty, my daughter knows I'm meeting you, can I take a selfie? And she says take my phone. I say no problem. But the head marshal says no problem. But the head marshal says no, no, no, we can't do that. She says there are enough press people, photographers, to take a picture of us. In my enthusiasm, I forget that I'm next to the queen.
Speaker 2:So I grab her, not in a vulgar way, but just I'm someone who likes to mess around and I get a slap in the face. I say, oops, I'm left-handed blind. So I look at her. She looks back at me big smile. I say, well, she's not, so I take her even better.
Speaker 1:So those photographers who are going to, they're going to fool me that court-martial. I'm going think I'll get a really heavy slap.
Speaker 2:That was his court-martial. He said what are you doing now? I said go to him. He better let me take a selfie so we don't get in trouble. The good thing was, two years later we were also the social project of Team Belgium for the Olympic Games in Rio and we meet each other again, and indeed our king was there. He said look, there's the man with the glasses. And his chief marshal was still walking behind him and he said we're not going to take selfies.
Speaker 2:Hilarity, but an insanely nice moment and of course that opens doors. But I wasn't convinced of the glasses of the future because I got a lot of problems with those glasses. They were made in China, so at that moment, 15 years ago, they were written differently. Difficult communication. We got glasses that weren't really right, all bubbles in them, children played with them. That wasn't sustainable enough either. And then I went looking for another solution. And that's how I got in touch with Jan Intveld, a Dutch engineer who was working on self-correcting glasses based on the Alvarez principle. These are two lenses, a positive and a negative, that shift over each other and I thought, wow, this is it. And then with that little glasses, people start, especially children 12 to 18 years old and older people for the reading problem. That's a little easier problem to solve the crop of glasses as they play. But we were mainly focused on 12 and 18 year olds, on a glasses size, and with those self-correcting glasses that was ideal.
Speaker 1:They correct that themselves Just like a binocular you turn a wheel until you look at it sharply.
Speaker 2:So, yes, that was an amazing story and we also helped more than 350,000 children worldwide, but in 2017, work locally always, or rather with the government, in cooperation with eye doctors, Because they know the problem but do not have a solution for it and I then did a study of how many of those 350,000 children now we have 400,000 that we have fully helped still wear those glasses, that glasses still wear. That was less than 20%.
Speaker 2:We can't be satisfied with that it's a pity, because worldwide we had a lot of attention. Walmart asked us to develop a glasses, but of course that was also a downside. That wasn't always beautiful. It worked, but they're not the most beautiful mothers. When I was in Antwerp I had a lot of gas, but not for the right reasons. So we say, oh that sucker is there. So you were stigmatizing people, and that's also a lesson in humility, a lesson in life. My challenge was to show children better, with the goal of making them better, to make them better able to study, a higher job, so actually to get them out of poverty. And if only one person would get out of poverty, my mission would be accomplished. But in the meantime I'm addicted to it. But that was also done in a protected workplace in the Netherlands, in Eindhoven. So we speak the same language it was very easy communication.
Speaker 2:Eindhoven is an hour away from Antwerp, so it was very close. But if less than 20% of the people would still put on their glasses because it's not nice enough, then they're not doing well, so I forgot. They don't just want to look better, they want to look better, and that's also the least of all, or not worse, I would say yes not worse, because you get a stamp right away. That's the least of all.
Speaker 2:Those people with glasses, yes, but from the north, from the south, from the east and the west, we are actually all the same. We look in the mirror, we look good, our hair looks good, but that glasses makes part of it. So, yes, and that was a lesson. And then I had to look for another solution, and then I started thinking out of the box and then I developed new technology. I call it the iSnap technology, or the round square. All glasses are asymmetrical. The glasses I made are symmetrical in different shapes, so the glasses I wear are symmetrical, so right can be left and left can be right. So I only need one mole to grind the glasses, do an eye test, we take the right strength and we snap that in, and children go straight home with their glasses. And we have done that in Mongolia and that works, of course. But you see, it doesn't stop.
Speaker 2:It's also to be seen, and that's always very important, is the timeline. I have the impression that everyone wants to rewrite history. You can't rewrite history. Everything has a reason in that history, also towards people and learns from it. But we live today, of course, and what are the possibilities today? And it mainly went to price. So I need 20 euros to make a glasses, the logistics, eye test and put on a child's face. This cost price, total cost price, this circle, I would say, is 20 euros, because I also want to communicate very openly with my donors. That's better.
Speaker 2:Where the money goes 20 euros is a glasses. Every glasses has to have a face. That was also the reason why we went into cooperation with the Red Ducks, Because we the scale.
Speaker 2:Yes, and at least they knew where the money went. One of my colleagues in Germany has one dollar glasses, and a one dollar glass costs 40 dollars. I find that difficult, and that continues to grow. But also worldwide, a lot of glasses are collected via the lines and that's all well intended. Those glasses are then processed in France and then they are distributed all over the world. The problem is that 4% of the glasses are used. 96% of the glasses remain there in boxes. Nothing is used, and so that model was for me, a bad model, and it has also been proven that it is not the right model, and that's what we're dealing with today. So I'm going to try to come up with a solution.
Speaker 2:We sometimes have to use the local situation. We always have to be respectful with the local policy, with the people, also the entrepreneurs, because it's the time of the missionaries that's long past. So that you deal with that with respect and how you make your target group very clear. I have never been threatened with death in Nigeria because the world of optometrists I am an optometrist actually thought I was taking their job. I say no, man, I create jobs. No, they say you take our work away because by correcting ourselves. They no longer need us, I say. But the people we help don't have any money to come to you. A visit to an optometrist is 30 to 50 dollars worldwide, even in countries where we think they are not wide enough. 30 to 50. That's just for your signature. So you know what strength. But your problem is not solved yet. Those people don't even have the money to do that. Let their solution be. Maybe, with the money we give, they will study better, they will earn more money, but they will still enter your circle.
Speaker 1:It's just a long-term solution.
Speaker 2:And then they understood that and they actually promoted that glasses.
Speaker 1:So then they came to number one, and number two was then those glasses were collected by the world, I would say, but that's not a good model. But you did look at that model because collecting glasses the idea is good. People have new glasses, they're in the closet, they can't do anything with them. Only the execution or the whole model around it is not so good. But now you're I'm forgetting With Reface, humal Labs, all that circle. Are you trying to find a solution in the current business?
Speaker 2:Well, that's where corona has been the cause of it. I've never had a month of congé in my life and then we had to leave it compulsory. And one of my best friends, jan Meriks, a pioneer in textile with C-Lab, who has been working with the circular model for years, also from the Netherlands, also linked to a Dutch company. The Netherlands is sometimes a bit further away than us, unfortunately. We can do that equally well, but sometimes we lack the guts to do it, and that also has a reason. If we don't win, we are a loser.
Speaker 2:In the Netherlands. They say he has learned, we are going to invest in it again. That is our Flemish mentality, from which we really urgently need to step down. We may be proud. That doesn't mean you have to have a thick neck, but you can be proud. But we are not sure that we should have a big head, but we can be proud. We are too little proud of what we do. I don't know if we can change that very quickly.
Speaker 1:Another generation or two.
Speaker 2:I hope that the younger generation and you see that too, they are more communicative, much stronger than we have grown up also get a bit of those skills of okay, let's learn. And I also have the feeling that it is more in there, although when I give lectures and then I ask Dikkels, yes, we want to be later, that is still a big question mark. But okay, that is also the generation. Now it has become a more complex story, the business With us. That might have been a little clearer, but it's also interesting. But by talking to Jan, I thought I see those glasses there. They're all over the place, nothing is done with them. He said think about it more deeply. And I did. I thought actually, every glasses holder has glasses in their shop. Let's take the glasses out and let's clean the glasses. And that's how I started after corona, to collect glasses and see how it goes, and with a mouthful of friends, of course. The advantage is now social media helps us with that, with a mouthful of friends. I've read that you collect old glasses and here are old glasses. I should start doing that Because I with Eyes for the World, seven or eight years ago I had a project here with Dakloze Antwerpen, on that side, here on the Rozenveld, not far from here, behind the corner.
Speaker 2:Behind the corner, behind the corner, and 600 people came to the scene. I screened them. 145 of them needed glasses. But of those 600 people I screened, more than 50% were Janssens and Peters. So people from our area. I saw guys walking around, people walking around who used to come to Café Local. I say, mate, what happened? They all have their own stories. It can happen to all of us, tim, I hope not, but it can go fast in life Real divorces, failures, diseases, whatever, never, never. I've said it before, never, never. I'm not going to say it again never, never. You never know what's going on in your life.
Speaker 2:I've also said it before never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, neveren Anciot, who was the founder of TocienW, to start a project with TocienW and that has grown and grown and grown, because there are a lot of people who don't have any money.
Speaker 2:And what is money? What is the price? I have based myself on the 20 euros that I also do with Eyes for the World. Of course we live in Belgium, we have other options, so the price of this glasses with glass is 60 euros. We have to calculate 21% BTW. Then there is already a lot of money. But people also get from their mutuality depending on their mutuality 30, 40, 50 euros paid. So a cost in glasses is only 10, 20 or 30 euros. Everyone has that in their budget. The advantage is that OCMWs no longer have to be paid hundreds of euros. That money can be spent for something else and people have the opportunity to choose a nice glasses.
Speaker 2:And with that circular model, of course the world changes. It gets more expensive. You have to be creative. But that 60 euros is that still feasible in this model? Because it must also be feasible. Also that 20 euros to help people, because the costs are rising. So it has to be feasible. And then I thought maybe I should apply that circular model in the social sector and I did that and I also saw that I could still collect very cool people who earned more than a second life. But that grew, that grew and that rose above my head Then, with article 60, refugees were recruited, but my location was too small. And then I started conversations with Ecozo, with Chris Bouwlings and Léonard Ruy, to see, yes, can't we start something together? Together, because they are always looking for new models? And so the glasses workshop started, where we have a social work position, where these people give glasses a second life, clean up, re-attach.
Speaker 2:Yes put new plates on. Put-attach. Yes, new plates, new plates. So really, yes, clean up again and make a valuable story.
Speaker 1:And you'll be cutting new glasses for it, and we'll be cutting the glasses on the table.
Speaker 2:But we'll go one step further?
Speaker 1:And are those symmetrical, or is that the story?
Speaker 2:They're not symmetrical Because the symmetrical is Because worldwide, with Eyes for the World, you have to let the people or the children go home with their glasses on. You don't have a sleeping bag, that's too complex, so we looked for a model that at that moment those people or those children can go home with their glasses on. Here we have many more possibilities. That's why we have adapted that. But then actually I forgot one more story, so refaced. I say how can I integrate that into my shop with a glasses man?
Speaker 1:The glasses man is your shop in Mechelen? Yes, in Mechelen and that's a regular store, yes, a regular store between Aakes.
Speaker 2:I don't want to be the regular store, with all due respect to my colleagues. But our landscape has changed. You have the professional, high-end, expensive brands, expensive glasses to arm themselves with the marketeers, the Pearls and the Hansanders. And then there are those from the non-optical world, Eisenmohr and Ecentate, who position the glasses to look good, as a sort of commodity, but good looking that's another power model.
Speaker 2:And then there are the glasses men. I always say Mechelen is a city of glasses. The top opticians are here, all the chains are here and the glasses man is here too and you compare, talk, go see and, where you feel best, buy there. But ask for the end price, because that is, I think, important. For me it's always four times my prices. I know in the optics world there are other rules and that doesn't always fit with my values and norms. In the story. I think if you take the menu card in a restaurant, you also see what prices you pay for it. The cupholder has to hang it out. In the optical world that's exactly the case. Yes, that mount is priced, but the glasses are not priced.
Speaker 1:So it's a selling of the pair.
Speaker 2:But that's another discussion. That's a choice, and I try to do it in a different way, with respect for my colleagues, because we need each other. That's why I say I promote the city of Mechelen as a city of glasses. I'd rather people not buy their glasses at my place but in Mechelen than if they buy it somewhere else. If they lose it, we lose it all.
Speaker 1:But then came the moment you said you wanted to integrate this story into your own business.
Speaker 2:Yes, and then I had the idea and I thought it was a good idea but it's not because you think it's a good idea that your consumer also has to participate, because in the end, your success is determined by your customer. The customer is king. There is a lot of value in it. He or she decides if they want to join or not. My idea was to get a subscription a glasses subscription €10 per month, so you pay €120. And then you have the right to a new glasses. You put the old glasses in and we use them in our circular model, in that social model. I think I have convinced a handful of people to participate in that. I also think because my concept is not expensive. They also said yes, but we wear glasses is longer than a year. You don't position yourself on an asentade, that would be more logical.
Speaker 1:It's a fashion item with which you change glasses with your collection wardrobe, While for quality and sustainability that's a bit.
Speaker 2:So they're not in favor of it Of succeed. That has reasons. You could only succeed in a concept if you have the financial means to communicate about it, like the big guys, the groups of Pearl and Hans Anders, because Eisenbohr and Hans Anders are not a story they are together.
Speaker 2:So I don't have those means. I always have to do it in a creative way that I have tried to do all my life, because that is more valuable for me and also more fun, but also your limitation. It is also a limitation that you cannot go further than that and then you have to make a decision. Do I continue with that or not? Maybe it was too early. It may be that I will apply that in five years. I still have a few ideas in my head for a cooperative. Why don't I make my client a shareholder? I'm also working on that, but is it the time to do that? Because then you get the question that, because the problem is does the client stay loyal? We had a phase where the client stayed loyal and then we had phases where the client looked everywhere. We're still in that phase, but I have the impression that the client becomes more loyal Because the professional in our story is then dying out why?
Speaker 2:Those who continue to do or who invest in their business mostly have a daughter or a son who can start the business? But if it's the end of the story, it's closed.
Speaker 1:A very well-known phenomenon in every sector.
Speaker 2:In every sector In the past that was our pension or part of our pension. Now it has little value. So, because you have to pay attention, you have to be busy with that, if we stop the story, are you prepared for that or do you go in a different direction? That's also what I'm playing with a bit. I try to be less and less dependent on myself, because that's also a, that's a courage, that's a strength, but it's also a fall.
Speaker 1:Yes, to be able to take part in a certain mission, you have, for example, to say something and to be able to be fully sustainable.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Let's come to ReFace towards the end of the podcast. We're going to go over our time, but I think it's interesting enough to that's not bad with me. It's not bad. You warned me in advance and I said that wasn't a problem. So with this it's still not a problem. In your store the glasses man Mechelen tried to put down via an approval model. That did not work. What was the step to reface here at Circuit in Antwerp-Zuid?
Speaker 2:So that step has been the glasses man is actually I call that an impact shop, where I can try everything out and also to see how the customer reacts.
Speaker 2:I was lucky. I have two parts in that shop and the back part is used for social engagement, also for the second pair of gloves. But then I also say that customers want to be interested. But how can we not buy that pair of gloves, not directly for that price, just for the look? I say yes, why not? Why should I put people in boxes? Because that's absurd for words. I don't like boxes.
Speaker 2:And then I thought I'm going to open it more. And then I got the chance, also via Jan. He said the circuit is actually a new model of a circle shop 2.0, where you can also rent a shop-in-shop. And then I thought I'm going to take a look at it and I thought why not a full-fledged second-hand glasses shop? That perfectly fits the concept of the circuit in the way of thinking To try to get that out of the way.
Speaker 2:Life is always up to the doers Try it out, get an idea, do it. If it works, it's better. If it doesn't, you've learned a lot. You can go on and work on other puzzles and then it quickly decides to do that and I liked that. We officially started in October. We see that there is a lot going on, that we have some interaction there, also a lot of people who react very positively. So a lot of smileys, laughing faces. But the fun thing is also that collaboration. Who comes into the store? Young, old, rich, poor, all nationalities and no one is looked at like, oh, what are you doing here?
Speaker 1:No, everyone is welcome.
Speaker 2:So it's also a bit like the Porsches are now also in an Audi at the Lidl. Back in the day it was a sedan. Oh, it's just difficult. Fortunately, that actually embraces each other. There are only very few concepts that embrace everyone. That are inclusive, that are inclusive and I love that inclusivity. I am a glasses man, the mayor is a customer, but I am also a customer, the one who doesn't have a roof over his head, and for me they are people.
Speaker 2:I am a man with a story and I like to listen to stories and also take out clothes, and you treat them the way we would treat each other, and I think that's an important truth in the shopping malls and we have now also started with all shops in shops, on the one hand, with the EcoZoo, all shopping malls in the Rivieraland have a shop in shop where you can donate old glasses and also choose a new pair of glasses with the right glasses and eye test or cooperation with the eye doctor.
Speaker 2:And now we are also working on this in Antwerp. We have now started the new store in Berchem in the station street. There is also a shop-in-shop there and it is intended to further scale that.
Speaker 1:And, if I understand it correctly, montures that are not reusable because you also have them. Are they brought back into the chain?
Speaker 2:Yes, that is now our new story ever. Together with Juma Labs, with Sebastian, we are writing that story On the one hand because of the experience that I have built up a bit within those concepts, also, of course, the glasses workshop that is working there, where we have learned a lot, and also the materials that we can reuse from there. And so, with the Evercircler story, we want to get my colleagues to collect old glasses, also those demo lenses. In every new glasses there are demo lenses, so that means that when the glasses are sold, the demo lens is thrown away and we are going to make new mounts out of it, new collections, which will then be distributed within the network of these circular opticians.
Speaker 1:Is that the intention to do it in Belgium or abroad?
Speaker 2:Step by step. In that sense, let's first consider Flanders, Belgium and if it is successful internationally, Because that is also a story that you can write about the borders.
Speaker 1:But well, step by step, I understand. That is our dream of course. If I make something warm. I have to speak at an event in the Netherlands in June for 300 opticians, so I might be able to tease them a bit.
Speaker 2:We also see, because the Netherlands is an important market. They are different set up, we are in a different landscape with a different way of thinking, and that's not wrong, that's also nice and I hope that we can push that balloon through to embrace each other. A glasses is actually a beautiful image. There is a bridge and there are arms in it, so let's build bridges and embrace each other. It is actually an ideal product to pass on as a creative entrepreneur.
Speaker 1:I think that's a beautiful quote to end your story with. Something tells me that your story is not yet written and that we have missed many beautiful anecdotes and other companies from your career or have not handled. But there has been a nice big thread through and, yes, impact, creativity and trust in your network working together. I have heard a lot of nice things. I don't know if you have anything to add.
Speaker 2:People say things like you know a lot of people. How do you network? That starts from tomorrow. When you come out, say good day. That's networking. You never know who you're going to say good talking to, but you never know if you're still crossing that person in your life and because of the good day you're already scoring a point. More Friendship costs you money and that's actually the basis for networking. Not what's on your card or not the title you wear, no, the person you are. That's the most important thing for me cool.
Speaker 1:I want to thank you for your beautiful story. I've never been quiet during a podcast, and that's not because you talk a lot, but because I loved listening it was an honor to be here.
Speaker 2:I think it's fantastic what you do. You're an inspiring person and an interesting person, so we can learn a lot from each other.
Speaker 1:Thank you for the compliments. Dear listeners, thank you for joining me in this story and enjoying it. Until next time, everyone. Until the next Team Retail Alright, team Retail.
Speaker 1:A fascinating conversation with Koen. It has certainly remained with me. There are several things that have remained with me, and one of the important things that I take with me is that we often judge an entrepreneur by his successes, but actually success is something temporary. It is not the quality of an entrepreneur. We have really heard in this story how higher your highs are, the greater your successes, the lower your downs can be. At Koen, it was so extreme that at some point he lost his self-image and his belief in himself and was so deep in the problems that he decided to take a life. That is really very intense and I'm very grateful that he wanted to tell it and also that he just the simple solution of yes, look, business is sometimes success and sometimes failure, but the moment you are going to fail, there is only one thing you can do and that is to talk about it and that is to look for solutions, because there are always solutions. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. I think it's a nice lesson. I'm very happy that he also regained his creativity at a certain point. Because creativity in this entrepreneur's story but actually in all entrepreneur's stories is really a super power, especially if you combine it with power of action. If you combine creativity and power of action, that becomes a super power. Then you have someone like Koen, who always has a lot of ideas but who succeeds in taking them right away and daring to try to see what it gives. And if you combine that smartly with people like Koen, if you have a good understanding of timing and context and I'm going to give an example the context is people are done eating at 10 o'clock and there is a nightlife from 1 o'clock. In between there is a hole. If you get the timing right to fill in that gap, then you're in first and you're in. But you need to have the power to continue.
Speaker 1:The first six months no one knew what they wanted with a concept. But they knew and they went for it. And then it's very often and it's really been shown, that you let go of the timing on time. You step out of a case on time, you sell the case on time. You don't stick to something that doesn't work. That too is getting paid. That too is undertaking.
Speaker 1:Koen has told it 35 projects in 35 years or 34 in 34. He has sold a lot of those projects successfully. That's impressive, but just as many of those projects have just stopped because it was too early, the timing was not right Look at the subscription model on glasses that timing was not entirely right. Or the context, because with Koen people come for a sustainable story, not for a fashion accessory that they change every six months. So there, the context is the same, but Opho, a man who understands that communication is very important, that you combine creativity with power of action, and that timing and context are everything for a company to successfully expand or to stop just in time. Last but not least, one clear red thread of his story is that that good day, that friendliness. Koen is an unlikely, friendly and humble man has opened so many doors in his life. We have up to our queen.
Speaker 1:Koen has people to gather around him through friendliness. He says look, I walk around the world and I start with a laugh every day and a good day when I meet people, and one good day can change the course of your life. I think that's a nice message. In a society in which we In the south of France, everyone says bonjour to each other with a smile, in a society where we do less and less, just say that good day. Networking isn't that exciting. Networking isn't high society. Just say good day. Networking is not that exciting. Networking is not high society. Just say good afternoon, I'm Tim, all good and you're gone. In short, nice lessons from an entrepreneur who is really successful in this field and who really has inspired us with his entrepreneur story and who, at the end of the day, is really an impact entrepreneur and who shows that if you indeed go from that good day to a good network, to a good collaboration, trust that you can let models work. Nobody believed in his circular glasses store. That model works. It is now expanding with Shop-in-Shops. There is room for new ideas, for new entrepreneurs who take things in a different way. If we dare to combine creativity with power, if we have our time in a context and if we, from a friendly, sincere connection like the bridge, makes the connection in the glasses in dialogue with other entrepreneurs, want to make a success out of it. In short, nice lessons from a nice entrepreneur.
Speaker 1:I enjoyed it. I hope you did too. If you found this a nice podcast, I would really love it. Hope you enjoyed it too. Did you like this podcast? I would love to hear your thoughts on the world through a short review on the podcast platforms. We are being listened to a lot thanks to you, but some good reviews would give us even more listeners, and that's what we really want. We inspire more people to look at retail in a different way, to do business in a different way and to become successful. Together, let's make it happen. Thank you, team retail. Until next time, until next time, team retail.
