Timo Sostmeier

Location	Van Leeuwen Germany
Position	Regional Sales Manager
At Van Leeuwen since	2020
Age	35

‘I thoroughly enjoy working in sales. My contacts with existing and new customers give me a great deal of satisfaction. In addition, in my leadership role I find it inspiring to get the most out of my team members. Sparring together to find the best solutions for our customers and then implementing them together. In my job I am able to perfectly combine these passions,’ says Timo Sostmeier, Regional Sales Manager at Van Leeuwen Germany.

‘I am responsible for a team of 25 colleagues who partly work in Frankfurt and partly in Mannheim,’ says Timo. ‘Together with the team I work on developing the best solutions for our customers each day. During the corona pandemic I learned to manage my team members remotely and in 2021 we still had to work from home of course. With the aid of software solutions, such as Microsoft Teams and Planner, we were able to quickly master working remotely together. The team adopted an extremely flexible attitude and I am proud of that.’

Global Key Account Team

One of the projects in 2021 that has given Timo a lot of satisfaction is the composition of the new Global Key Account Team in which he played a leading role. ‘With this team we are able to provide full-service solutions to our internationally operating customers,’ he says. ‘We appoint a single Account Manager for these companies at Van Leeuwen Germany, so that the customer does not need to interact with multiple Van Leeuwen Account Managers.

For example, for a customer in the agricultural industry the Global Key Account Team gathers all of the pipe and tube products at a single location, so that they can be delivered as a single package. I am the point of contact for this customer.’

The Regional Sales Manager is pleased with all the opportunities he is afforded at Van Leeuwen to develop himself on a personal and business level. ‘I started off as a trainee and this allowed me to become familiar with various facets of the company’s business. I was also able to take various courses that enabled me to further improve my leadership skills,’ he says.

Focus on customers and people

In his opinion, Van Leeuwen distinguishes itself from other companies due to its major focus on customers; they are number one. In addition, a great deal of attention is focused on employees, on their development and wellbeing. To illustrate his point, Timo tells us about his meeting with the members of the Management Board in September 2021. ‘They were very interested in the day-to-day affairs of Van Leeuwen Germany and the topics that are of importance to our customers. I was also impressed by their detailed knowledge of the market and the challenges we are confronted with in the present times. The interest and commitment are reflected by colleagues throughout the company.’

As manager, Timo also devotes a lot of attention to people. ‘I consider this important, because people are the capital of our company.’