Once upon a time

Once upon a time ...

As a child I loved building machines. For example, I combined my LEGO with a bicycle dynamo to make something that nobody else had ever made before. For me, this was just the beginning.

Building machines is in my blood

Years later I became a representative at a packaging company, where I also invented several new machines. For example, I built a machine for the poultry industry that made perforated sheets on a roll. A few years later I worked as a representative at a company that did screen-printing, among other things. There I built a machine to fix and dry screen prints. You will understand by now: building machines is in my blood.

From EasyOpen bags to the first EasyPlast machine

In 1986 I decided to start trading in packaging materials. Niverplast (Nieuwenhuis Verpakkingen and Plastics) became a fact. The handling of packaging materials soon became such a success that I decided to produce bags myself: the EasyOpen bags. The first colleagues came into service and the first regular customers were also a fact. In 1997 one customer asked me if it was possible to place these bags automatically - with a machine. Well, why not? In April 1997 the prototype of our machine was ready and in July 1997 we had already sold twelve of them. It was our first machine, which I am still very proud of: the EasyPlast.

The biggest compliment I have ever received

We recently bought the very first EasyPlast we ever made at an auction. When I walk past it I still remember one thing: stress. At first the machine did not always work as it should, so we had some dissatisfied customers. We worked extremely hard to get everything running smoothly. For example, my colleague Fons drove around the Netherlands with a caravan. He camped at the parking lots of our customers - just to be there when something went wrong. After all, our customers had put their trust in us and we did not want to damage that trust. At Niverplast you not only buy a machine, but also the people behind the machine. That is our greatest strength. In the end, fortunately, everything turned out great for the EasyPlast. And the fact that all twelve customers later on bought new machines is still the biggest compliment I have ever received.

Anno 2019

More than twenty years later we build packaging lines for customers all over the world. I have more than 150 colleagues and we have a large number of different standard machines in our product range. I still have not lost my passion for building machines. If I see a new machine in our workplace I immediately want to see how it is engineered. I just cannot resist. Perhaps the R&D department is the right place for me in the future. You never know, just wait and see.

Article written by Gerrit Jan Nieuwenhuis