After the acquisition of Spotted by Locals in 2021 – the beloved community Sanne & myself founded in 2008 – I stayed on as “Interim CEO” for a while. Spotted by Locals was the third start-up I co-founded that was acquired, after Eurodidakt Suriname (1997) and Gezond Verzuim (2001). What I did To prepare the acquisition I: After the acquisition… Continue reading Project case study – Spotted by Locals
I’ve always been fascinated – and frankly a bit obsessed – by “filing” information. I guess this gene was passed on from my father, who has always been an early adopter of technology and an avid digital filer of photographs. From his phone he will find a picture of a birthday party in 1987 in seconds! My father gave me… Continue reading Organize all the information in your life
Stealth camping is wild-camping without being noticed. I really recommend it if you love freedom, and don’t like big campers & campgrounds.
This year we had the pleasure to spend our 6th summer in our favorite wild camping spot in Greece: Elea, West Peloponnese. A big thanks to Antonis & Irini for introducing us to to this magical place in 2009. This year we spent it with very special guests: the A&J&A&P&A family from Amsterdam came to visit us for a second… Continue reading Wild camping Peloponnese
Reben is a really cool Amsterdam start-up producing a better Spritz. With local Dutch rhubarb – and way less sugar! Geerben – a daring entrepreneur I really admire – started Reben with his mother’s unique recipe, using rhubarb from her backyard. Now it’s rapidly popping up in some of the best restaurants and bars in Amsterdam. And: you can order… Continue reading Project case study – Reben
Recently, I read “Buy back your time” by Dan Martell. If I had seen this picture before I got the book, I definitely would not have started…., And maybe you won’t want to read on either. But I do recommend you to get the book if you’re an entrepreneur. I read it twice! Outsource more The main message of the… Continue reading “Buy back your time” – get an assistant
If there’s one piece of software that’s had an outsized impact on my productivity, it’s aText. This tiny text expansion tool runs quietly in the background of my Mac, but it’s saved me so much time. At its core, aText is simple: you create custom abbreviations that automatically expand into full phrases, sentences, or even paragraphs. For example, when I… Continue reading My #1 time-saver: aText
I used to check and answer my email at least 50 times a day. Multi-tasking by checking email regularly is one of the best things you can do to fry your 🧠. It was so difficult to change this habit, but when I finally did it it made me so much more productive and creative. Now I do so just… Continue reading Stop checking your email!
My client is a Youtube star! 🌟 Dimitris Hall founded Easy Greek, a super fun way to learn Greek. His business and team grew fast (11 people now!), and with success comes… chaos and plenty of last-minute stress and working nights and weekends. My job was to bring structure to Easy Greek’s processes, set up a task management system and… Continue reading Project case study – EasyGreek
Since the 1990’s I’ve been keeping a list of business ideas that I will most likely never execute. I’ve shared three social business ideas on LinkedIn. Hopefully I can inspire someone, in some way. Do get in touch to brainstorm, or if you need a co-founder who can do the back-office 💩 ! Idea 1: LocalTees The concept Sourcing t-shirts… Continue reading Never-started social businesses
