We're back again! Finally there is room again to talk to responsible entrepreneurs, ask them about their motivation when it comes to reuse and highlight their business. We pick up the thread with Joris and his two "neighbors. Neighbor Arnhem & Nijmegen, where you can buy circular building materials. Circular!!! Hear me tell you, we'll explain that later. At Buurman Arnhem & Nijmegen they sell leftover construction wood, wooden cladding but also tiles and many other things you need for your building and renovation plans.

Responsible Living With: Neighbor - Arnhem (& Nijmegen)

As always, I begin by introducing the faces behind the responsible company and how it came into being. Buurman Arnhem & Nijmegen was created by two enthusiastic people. Of which with Joris the very first seed was once planted by a colleague who said, "I would actually like to start a Neighborhood". At the time Joris, like many of you probably, had no idea what 'a neighborwas exactly. Now of course you are going to read all about it in this blog, but Joris went all in on his colleague's explanation and immediately shouted, "How cool! We should do it!" and so it happened.

A Man With A Plan

"Just look at the feasibility in your city and then if you have a plan, knock again."

Bianca from Neighbor Utrecht

Of course, starting up his own Neighbor didn't come naturally. Although Joris and his colleague were both very enthusiastic, he eventually took up the challenge himself. Ambitious as he is, there were many more ideas in his head. Not just a Neighbor, but perhaps even a complete circular hub with multiple specializations under one roof. In the end, family expansion made him decide to keep it a bit smaller and call the, just opened, branch in Utrecht. To ask here how setting up a Neighbor was done. Where he was told, "Just look at the feasibility in your city and if you have a plan, knock again."

Determined, he set to work, and during his research, Pim and Marleen joined the plan. This was about 2.5 years ago. During this period of planning and research, both, one by one, dropped out again. Not because they no longer liked the plan or did not enjoy working together. But the priorities at that time were somewhere else, family expansion, a busy job, such is life. But as Joris himself says, he was completely on his feet. He was in the middle of horror renovations and had a gap in his work schedule. So it really was, "Now or never!" With the help of Laura from Buurman Rotterdam, a meeting was then organized with various stakeholders, including the municipality of Arnhem & the municipality of Nijmegen.

Neighbor & Neighbor

For Marleen, meanwhile, it had started to itch and therefore decided to join again. From then on everything seemed to be going quite well. NYMA makerspace came forward as a possible location because she herself really wanted "a Neighbor. But there was no room for a store there. Yet they decided not to let this location, the epicenter when it comes to creating, pass them by. When the news was reported to the various stakeholders, the problem of the store resolved itself as if by itself. The Municipality of Arnhem was extremely disappointed and would have liked to have had a Neighbor as well. A possible location was offered and then within a year there were 2 Neighbors. Not entirely according to plan: "We had actually thought: we will first do 2 years in Nijmegen and see how it goes."

The Red Thread

I asked about what drives Joris when it comes to corporate responsibility and a nice and thoughtful answer came: "I did think about what is the common thread in my professional career now and I found 3 things in it."

First of all, "Is that I believe that everyone is good at something and can put that to use in different ways." Joris likes to use these things for something that is good for something or someone else. The things he gets involved in often have some form of community involvement. In this, the approachability is of great importance, "That's also why Neighborhood appeals to me so much. There is no finger pointing. Like, you have to take shorter showers!" We all know where that comes from. According to Joris you can visit Buurman for all kinds of reasons: to search for treasure, to find something unique or just to score a cheap shelf. "That's all good, everyone is welcome and I think that's the way it should be," he says.

Second, Joris is a real booster. He likes to bring people together and to achieve something together. This is of course reflected in the fact that there are now no less than two 'Buurmannen', one in Arnhem and one in Nijmegen. But also in the conversations with potential suppliers, he says: "I also really enjoy looking with them to see how we can set up a collaboration that is interesting for both and in this way make small impacts in different places, all of which serve a larger purpose." Lastly, this also applies so towards clients, being able to give them the time and attention and that is therefore the driving force behind this venture.

The Circular Construction Market

"Circular means circular, circular or repeating and, in the context of economy, refers to a system in which products and raw materials are continuously reused, repair is promoted, and waste is minimized to preserve value and protect the environment. Thus, in a circular economy, waste becomes the raw material for new products, as opposed to the linear economy where products are discarded after use."

So Neighbor sells (construction) materials that are considered "waste" or "leftover" elsewhere. Because they work according to the Social Franchise model at Buurman, not every store has the same offer. However, wood can be seen as one of the materials that is mainly and in every store. Each store basically takes care of its own stock. Although they can also divide this among themselves. For example, as in the cooperation rigged with Accsys. A company that trades preserved wood on a large scale, with acidification, and with which Buurman is now running a test to allocate the residual stream it.

"We want to cooperate with you all right, but we will come with a truck. You have to take one truck at a time."

Accsys

"We want to cooperate with you all right, but we will come with a truck. You have to take one truck at a time." Joris indicates: So that's 40 m3 and so the whole shed would be full of their wood. Right now the Social Franchise model is favorable again, because then this wood can be divided among 6 Neighbors.

Wood, Tiles and More

As mentioned before, they have mainly wood. First of all, wood is good to reuse but also because there were already good existing relationships in this. So people can always turn to a Neighbor for this. "We are now slowly expanding this, we just did a first test with a wholesaler in tiles," says Joris, "Just to see if that works as well" and if I myself, Tamar that is, would have had to renovate a bathroom, I would have known.

The rest of the store is supplemented with "specials. Joris says the following about this: "We are not a thrift store, but we definitely have the attraction that a thrift store also has. So if you want to browse a little bit you can really find a treasure there". That is something he would also like to keep that way.

Joris, since his home remodeling job was botched by the contractor, has been very diligent about doing odd jobs himself. In which he regularly uses Buurman's circular building materials. So the choice to go with Buurman has had its advantages. Besides, how wonderful that Joris was able to turn their horror renovation into something that is hopefully becoming a dream place and that you were able to do it yourself!

Material With A Story

Both rural and local, a nice mix is between products coming from all over the country, each with its own story. For example, MDF boards could be found coming from the Kröller-Müller Museum in Arnhem come. But also old benches from tent builder de Markies from Nijmegen, these have been at festivals, for example.

"Trees that are felled in the city, to saw boards from them, dry them and be able to sell them again here. So that, for example, your tree that you used to drink roses under at the corn market, that you later have a coffee table from that at home."

Joris

They are currently working on a cooperation with the municipality of Arnhem, to also offer city wood. "Trees that are felled in the city can be cut into planks, dried and sold here again. So that, for example, the tree under which you used to drink roses at the korenmarkt (corn market) can later be used as a coffee table at home." In this way, the building materials you use in your home will also have a story to tell.

Workshop

A neighbor wouldn't be complete without a workshop, where you can not only rent a workbench, possibly with guidance. But where workshops are also given and where you can do team building with your organization. The workshops are designed for the novice handyman. "So, hey how do I handle a cordless drill, or a crosscut saw. So that you start to feel more confident to get going with machines yourself," says Joris.

"So if one time a shelf at your home breaks, you don't immediately run to IKEA to buy something new. But that after this workshop you can make it yourself. Then after the second time, when you look back at your piece proudly and you think; "Hey, that was fun!". Then you can move on to a furniture making course where you learn to make dovetail joints.

Team building can be done at Buurman for you and your colleagues but also sometimes as a bachelor party. This can be in the form of a soapbox race or geometric wall-art. "This can be, for example, the company's own logo, which they can therefore later actually hang up at their workplace," says Buurman. But there is also room to propose one's own plan and execute it together. This of course involves using leftover materials from the store and you are also well challenged in this.