Karolina Dvorakova
Summary of the main findings from the interviews:
Community
- The strength of the Texelaars’ community was again emphasized
- Texellars are capable, eager and willing to collaborate in improving their island
Established organisations
- TOF, JONT: aim to:share the knowledge among members, educate, facilitate place for networking. Rule: open inside, close outside
- TOP: overarching all the entrepreneurs on Texel, each of them pays yearly contribution. The money not only from TOP but also municipality and TESO goes yearly to VVV
- VVV has much higher position on Texel than elsewhere; here functions as the main promotion agency of Texel, attracting tourists and thus boosting the local economy
Sustainable entrepreneurship
- Need to be profitable
- The business need to aim for long term
- The Texellars are creative people, but need to be inspired -> organizations as TOF or JONT can play an important role in teaching
- Older entrepreneurs on Texel have a lot of authority and knowledge and could become coaches for the startups
- Lean management concepts would be a good start for many startups to test the ideas and possible demand, however the concepts need to be taugh
- Sustainability in entrepreneurship will grow naturally in the future once being sustainable becomes more profitable than not being
Financial collaboration among Texelaars
- Already tested in TESO or Texel Energie
- People will collaborate as long as they seen some sort of individual benefits in it (eg. being shareholder of windmill – interest) -> always money driven
- Not possible for everything, depends on the function, which should be of benefit for all Texelaars
Relationship Texelaars <-> tourists
- The tourists are appreciated as the local economy depend on the amount of them
- However, not that many tourists should and could be accommodated in Texel -> the amount of beds for tourists is limited by the Gemeente and the locals are keen about this regulation
- -> tourists appreciated, but to a certain point
- 1/3 of the tourist beds are currently owned by only one company, which Texelaars are not very fond of as it gives a lot of power to the hand of one organization-> it is not sure whether such company will subsequently offer job opportunities for the local (e.g. in case of maintenance of the hotels)
