Eggebeen (DSV): ‘Raising warehousing’s image against tight labour market’

After studying Logistics & Economics, Edwin Eggebeen worked for a long time at Morres Wonen. When he met the then managing director of DSV in 2007, he was immediately sold by the company’s diversity and dynamism. “My heart has always been in logistics,” says Eggebeen. “I don’t like doing the same thing every day. At DSV, I entered a world with many different customers, people and processes.”

Operational knowledge

Eggebeen started his career at DSV Solutions on 1 April 2007. He held the position of key account manager for several years. He then held various roles and responsibilities at different levels within the organisation. “Each role brought a different dynamic. I came into contact with commercial, operational, financial and human resources. Warehouse management was completely new to me and required a different way of managing and communicating. All these roles prepared me for my current position of managing director. How do you look at operations and processes? Where can you improve? Then it is important to have operational knowledge,” he clarifies.

DSV Solutions, which has nine branches in Belgium, handles warehouse operations for its customers. “I manage those operationally, but am also responsible for finance, sales and the other support departments in Belgium,” he says. “It’s a country function, which is a logical move because you can look much more at synergies. Labour market tightness is a hot topic. How do we deal with that now? How can we deploy people multifunctionally at the different sites?”

New building

DSV Solutions has new construction plans for 2024, including a 120,000-square-metre warehouse. “Ghent has always been one of the largest healthcare hubs within DSV. It is a geographically convenient location, close to North Sea Port and Port of Antwerp-Bruges. Brussels Airport and Liege Airport are also close by, as is Paris. Indeed, apart from containers, we also have a lot of air cargo shipments.”

Although the focus is on the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries, the warehouse will have a versatile role and offer flexibility to store various products. “The spaces can be adapted to different temperatures and requirements,” he says. The new building will receive BREEAM Excellent certification. “This underlines DSV’s commitment to environmentally friendly logistics operations, solutions and its responsibility as a leading service provider in Belgium, as well as its commitment to a more sustainable future.”

People need to be able to see that a warehouse is a nice workplace rather than a dusty location

One of the biggest challenges is the labour market shortage, says Eggebeen. “Upon completion of the construction project, we need additional employees for our customers’ operations. We are soon talking about 350 extra workers. That means looking externally, through various avenues.”

One of those avenues is raising the image, not only of DSV Solutions, but of warehousing logistics as a whole. “Many still have the idea of a dusty warehouse, which we are not at all,” he says. “That’s why I also want to open the doors so that people see that a warehouse is a bright and clean environment and a nice workplace for employees instead of a dusty location.”

Another avenue is automation. “That makes the profession sexier and therefore more attractive to our employees. For instance, we work with drones to do inventory management. Recently, we also deployed a robot for cleaning activities,” he says. “These are examples of tasks that you find it increasingly difficult to find employees for. We not only make it more attractive for our employees, but also for outsiders so that they like to come and work for DSV.”

Win-win situation

Another challenge is sustainability. “Surely we are quite proud that DSV, as one of the largest logistics parties in the world, was the first to say that we will meet the targets agreed at the Paris Convention. Meanwhile, we have already tightened those targets. By 2030 we want to reduce 50% of emissions and by 2050 we want to be completely carbon neutral. That means we have to make the right choices now, including through the buildings we have put up. There, no more gas or electricity comes from outside. Everything is generated by ourselves. This allows us to make big leaps. For our customers, we also have full reports so they can see what their carbon footprint is. This is becoming increasingly important, also for our customers to resell their products. This creates a win-win situation.”

On weekends, I go running to sort out thoughts

Edwin Eggebeen is married and has two daughters. “Family life is important to me. To relax, I travel often. On weekends, I do running. That also helps to sort out thoughts and get refreshing new ideas again. Apart from that, I am a Fleming from Zeeland, similar to the Belgian Burgundian. I therefore love good food, cooking, a nice glass of wine or a pint.”