You won't have noticed: Yellowgrape has grown rapidly in recent years. The team has expanded, we have welcomed a lot of new customers and many existing customers have scaled up very fast. We think growth is important because it offers opportunities to the entire organization. Not only in terms of turnover, customers and colleagues, but also our services are constantly evolving. For example, our data proposition has expanded considerably and we have enriched our services with the disciplines of CRO and SEO.
This growth involves continuous tweaking in all areas: whether it's about our idiosyncratic approach or our vision. But, always while maintaining our excessive focus on e-commerce. In this blog, we take you into the challenges of growth and our ideas about future (internal and external) forms of cooperation. Finally, we share a very important and fun update about housing.
Growing as an organization is great, but it also comes with challenges. In recent years, Yellowgrape has continuously opened several vacancies. Our new colleagues need to be properly onboard so that they immediately feel at home, understand the Yellowgrape vision and can act from here. The faster we grow, the more questions arise. How do we maintain our culture, even though we are growing at a rapid pace? How do we maintain our leading position? How do we ensure that we never, ever have to make concessions? In other words: how can Yellowgrape grow in a scalable way?
And that's not to mention the practical issues. Do we all still fit on our boat? 😉 And how can we keep having lunch together? If you visit our office regularly, you will see for yourself that our beautiful canal house is bursting at the seams. At the end of 2018, we moved into the new office with a 12-member club, but we are now moving towards 35 colleagues.
When it comes to practical challenges, such as the limited space of the building, you are quickly tempted to come up with practical solutions. A larger office is therefore a logical answer. During this thought process, however, it became clear to us that there is a question behind the above questions.
What brought us to this point? What were the drivers of the growth that developed Yellowgrape from Rik and Johan aan het IJ into a large family on the Herengracht? If we can answer these questions, we also know what things to stick to in order to enter the next phase successfully and in a scalable way.
When asked about Yellowgrape's success factors, we have clear answers. Yellowgrape has an excessive focus on e-commerce and we have built the entire proposition around this. The team is working on it daily and continuously. This ensures that we can make a real impact with customers and that makes them happy. In addition, we often hear from customers that they really appreciate the short lines of communication and the team's involvement.
Another important success factor is the team itself. From the start, we said that our team always comes first. We devote a lot of time and attention to building and maintaining the Yellow family. It is not without reason that this is one of our core values and Yellowgrape ended last year in the top 10 Best Workplaces 2021 in the Netherlands. Customers and partners also feel that this is an important part of our DNA.
Back to the question behind the question. How do we continue to work successfully with each other and with our customers so that Yellowgrape can (continue to) grow in a scalable way? For us, this is based on a number of elements. As mentioned, we want to maintain the Yellowfamily core value at all times. In addition, we want to keep the internal organizational structure as flat as possible and the communication lines short. The excessive focus on e-commerce remains the core of the proposition, combined with a good dose of entrepreneurship.
If we want to grow in a scalable way as an organization, we also need to organize our form of cooperation even better internally and externally. To optimize this, we will work over the next 12-24 months to roll out a cell structure within the organization. The cell structure is based on the cell philosophy of Eckert Wintzen, an absolute visionary in the field of business and management. In his book Eckert's Notes, he explains the cell philosophy and describes the successful implementation process of the cell structure within his own organization. Based on his philosophy, we have developed an updated model that allows us to transform Yellowgrape into a scalable structure as an organization.
You may be wondering what this means for our colleagues and customers. Over the next 12 to 24 months, we will work towards setting up the two customer teams. In each customer team, all disciplines are secured and we work from the Yellowgrape vision and approach, exactly as you would expect from us. Each customer team serves a varied portfolio. In doing so, we not only guarantee professional and personal service, but we also ensure that our colleagues stay involved with each other and that our culture is maintained.
In addition, we stimulate horizontal cooperation at the discipline level. After all, we think it is important that colleagues within the paid advertising team, for example, also continue to work together, regardless of which customer team they are in. This is how we remain one Yellowfamily, approachable, crystal clear and pioneers pur sang.
The new form of cooperation and cell structure also requires that a flexible workplace is available at all times and for all colleagues. Both with an entire customer team, with colleagues from the same specialty, as well as individually. Not only at the moment, but also in the future as the team grows. We're already hinting at it: Yellowgrape is growing out of its jacket at Herengracht 231, which brings us back to the practical issue. What to do with housing?
We considered various options and looked at locations. In the end, we came to the conclusion that we want and should stay on the canal. Because those canals are in our DNA and we can't ignore them.
A second location in the heart of Amsterdam is therefore a very logical solution. We are therefore proud to announce the second Yellowgrape clubhouse. In Q3 of 2022, the doors of the new office at Herengracht 407 will officially open!
In the coming months, we will include our customers and partners in the process of the new forms of cooperation. Of course, this also includes the necessary updates about our new location. We can't wait!
