Jasper Gast is now offering product support for Black Bruin customers in Holland, Belgium and northern Germany

It is very much thanks to Area Sales Director Mattias Klasmann that Black Bruin now has a fresh new resource to help customers in Holland, Belgium and northern Germany with product support, that’s Jasper Gast. Mattias and Jasper worked closely together on several projects when Mattias was with Fluitronics and Jasper for AMCA Hydraulic Fluid Power. There was a good click between the two experts in power transmission and their cooperation was so fruitful that when Black Bruin came to need more muscle in their product support team to serve the growing clientele in the area, Mattias immediately thought of Jasper. And Jasper didn’t think twice.

Profound understanding of the customers

Throughout his career, Jasper has been focused on technical sales. Through his own company JG Controls, Jasper is a dealer for Swedish Scanreco remote controls in the Benelux area. For Black Bruin, Jasper will be concentrating on product support for both mobile and industrial application. “That was basically what Black Bruin’s Managing Director Seppo Koiranen was asking for, someone who would understand the problems and help customers by solving them,” Jasper laughs. He feels his job is to help customers with whatever problems they may have. He speaks fluent German, so he can provide support in both the Benelux area and in northern Germany, which is geographically close.

For Jasper the biggest customer segments are currently dredging, piling and winches. ”And hopefully some big OEMs,” he says enthusiastically.

Every market is “on fire” now; demand is high and availability is low. Critical parts are missing from many companies’ production lines. So we need action. It is a little bit heated up, everybody buying for stock to ensure security of supply and continuation. The opportunities are there,” Jasper believes.

What Jasper thinks of Black Bruin

Jasper believes that Black Bruin is definitely there among the top brands in hydraulic motor quality. “When Mattias approached me about working for Black Bruin, I realised that I had seen their products left and right, I just had not thought about it,” Jasper says. “Their products are always inside some other machine giving that extra boost to some other great brand. For example, in a really, really big winch, the whole body is the winch and the motor is inside and you can’t see it, but it’s there and it’s a really critical part that makes the whole thing work.”

“Black Bruin thinks with the customer and for the customer, providing the solutions that the customer is actually requesting and needs, not just something that is in their portfolio. That kind of approach is less and less appreciated in real life by the bigger brands. Those companies think only of volumes and quantities and low prices.  At the end of the day it may not give the best solution for the customer. I have seen that Black Bruin is different – also with reasonable delivery times – and that impresses me. What I want to do is help the customer. That’s what makes me tick.”

The hydraulic market in the Netherlands is not very big, so a reputation for good service spreads fast by word of mouth. In that, Jasper thinks that “human nature” helps.

In his opinion, for a Dutch person to join a Finnish company is not difficult at all. ”In my experience, Finnish people are exactly like the Dutch, direct and honest. If we cannot do it, solve a customer’s problem, we are ready to admit it upfront. Hopefully I don’t need to do that very often though,” Jasper explains. “We make no false promises. We would rather surprise the customer by solving the problem after an initial I am not sure, than disappoint them after first saying Yes. I think we can.”

Are all Dutch people football enthusiasts?

At least Jasper is. In his spare time he plays for a veterans 35+ team, and he is pretty serious about it. In his youth, at school, he remembers playing against one of the football world’s absolute stars, Arjen Robben, who in fact last year came out of retirement and now plays for the same team he played for at the beginning of his career, FC Groningen. ”He was two or three years younger than us, but totally unstoppable even then,” Jasper recalls how it was at school.

Jasper also plays tennis and enjoys ice-skating on the canals in winter, at least when it is possible. Last winter the canals froze solid, but you could not skate because it was so windy that there was a layer of dust on top of the ice. It was like sandpaper and ruined the skate blades and of course skating on sandpaper is no fun at all.

Jasper and his partner Kim have two daughters, aged 7 and 9, which is a lot work, jokes Jasper. The family is living in temporary housing now, their house having been damaged by earthquakes – yes, in Holland – but they finally have had happy news that they will be able to move into their new home by the end of this year. And that will be a totally new house, because strengthening a house to withstand earthquakes is more expensive than demolishing the old house and building a new one. At least in Holland.

We are very excited to welcome Jasper as part of Black Bruin team! You can reach him at: +31 620 754 338 or jasper.gast@blackbruin.com