Without risks you won’t get anywhere

The move to Bercomex

In no time, the company was growing roses, carnations and alstroemerias on no less than 300 hectares of land. The company was growing fast, and the second generation was already working at the company. Juan Pablo: “I joined the team 7 years ago. Our biggest challenge at the time was training and retaining personnel. It was about time for the next step in the automation of the process of flower processing. It was my task to realise this. At the time, we weren’t working with Bercomex yet, but I had heard of Bercomex before. Bercomex was known as the biggest innovator in this sector, but in Colombia hardly anyone was working with Bercomex machines. I was a newcomer, and a lot was expected of me. I had to prove myself and decided to go for it. I flew to the Netherlands, and shortly after we bought our first Furora, the most expensive machine from the Bercomex range. This immense change made the management team rather nervous, since I was tinkering away on the backbone of a successful company. It turned out to be a successful step soon enough, and I was able to breathe again. In the end, the ROI was a little longer than expected, but by now the Furora has more than earned itself back”. In the meantime, the Bercomex range has been expanded with a number of traditional Bercomex flower lines, and in 2020 an investment was made in the Flora Bunchmaster for the processing of spray-carnations. “When it comes to support, Bercomex had some improvement to do. It’s good that Bercomex Americas was established a few years back, to guarantee quicker support”, says Juan Pablo.