The first large assignment for our new edibo business unit in Antwerp is a fact. For a steel manufacturer in the petrochemical industry, we are building a concrete structure hall, with adjacent offices and an apartment. A mixture of industrial and traditional construction. 

First fruit of new contacts

With branches in Lommel, Eindhoven and Fernelmont (edibosud), edibo covered the largest part of Belgium and South Holland. A piece of the market that remained fairly untapped: the westside of our country.

With the recent foundation of our fourth business unit for the Antwerp-Ghent region, we want to change that. After months of prospecting and meeting new potential partners, our constructive challengers received their first large assignment in this new territory.

Mixture of construction styles

The name of the commissioner: JRN Construct. This company builds steel constructions like silos for the petrochemical industry, but also staircases, platforms and stainless-steel piping.

We were brought into contact with the building consultant through their architect, who had been on our radar during our prospection efforts. Their construction plans: on the one hand, a concrete structure hall with concrete panels in black Silex panels and sandwich panels, with room for a crane track. On the other hand, an area with office space and an apartment in traditional masonry, finished with glued brickwork.

It’s up to our constructive challengers to ensure the groundworks up to the WWT finishing. The techniques and finishings will be for account of the client.

Direct trusting bond

In our edibo method, we intensively engage the building consultant/client and the architect, starting from our internal research. We had already performed a preliminary study for this client in the tendering stage. We respected the architect’s detailed tendering documents but took a critical view of the project from the start, offering a couple of alternative suggestions.

This proactive approach – focused on technical substantiation and flexible thinking – gave our client more trust, which eventually lead to an agreement and a cooperation.

Furthermore, we engaged in a couple of collaborations with strong local subcontractors for a number of important works.

Deadline: summer of 2022

The biggest challenge of this project lies in establishing a foothold in a new region and with new fixed building partners. Even in these turbulent times, we always respect the agreed upon deadline – we are now even ahead of schedule. Timing was also a reason why the building consultant/client preferred to work with edibo.

In other words, we’ve got our work cut out for us. With this project, we’ve already established a beautiful, solid foundation for our future activities in the Antwerp-Ghent area. Hopefully resulting in many more great future projects.

Looking for an industrial contractor who handles things differently?

Are you looking for an industrial contractor who does not only listen to your needs, but who also thinks along proactively on how to make the absolute most of your building project? Now, but also in future?

We at edibo have over 40 years of experience in high-level industrial construction with numerous references in Belgium and the Netherlands. Now the time has come to settle in the Antwerp-Ghent region as well.

Is your industrial construction project on the scaffolds and do you want to share ideas with us? We would love to! Feel free to contact us for a non-binding consultation.