Why Venlo? Venlo has everything you need!

There are numerous reasons to choose Venlo. The most important are:

• Venlo has an ideal location,
• it has a varied economy, with logistics, agrofood, manufacturing and knowledge-intensive industry and retail as the most important pillars,
• it has a varied employment market,
• it offers the right educational facilities,
• it’s innovative,
• it's pioneer of C2C and stimulates circularity,
• it’s international,
• it has an attractive city center, with everything you’d expect to find,
• and Venlo is also a great place to live.

Venlo has an ideal location

You can’t miss Venlo!

Venlo has an ideal location! On the banks of the river Meuse, close to the German border, and at a strategic point between Amsterdam Schiphol Airport and the ports of Rotterdam and Antwerp on the one side, and the Central European hinterland on the other.

Excellent infrastructure

Venlo has excellent infrastructure, with:

• highway links in all directions,
• good rail links: the most important railway line linking Rotterdam and the German hinterland – the ‘Brabant route’ – runs through Venlo,
• a port on the river Meuse, with a container terminal for inland shipping (more information),
• a rail container terminal (more information),
• and another under construction (more information).

That’s why Venlo is the biggest inland terminal in the Netherlands.

Venlo is a pioneer of Cradle to Cradle

Venlo promotes circular systems

Venlo aims to lay the basis for the economy of tomorrow’s society. That’s why it is one of the first cities to embrace Cradle to Cradle (C2C) thinking and working. Cradle to Cradle approaches sustainability from an economic perspective.

Waste = food

The basic principle of Cradle to Cradle is that there’s no such thing as waste. Waste = food. When a product reached the end of its life, that product itself, or the components from which it is made, serve as raw material of the same or better quality. This is then either returned to nature or used to make the next new product.

There are not many other places on Earth where Cradle to Cradle principles are so strongly embedded and so widely supported as in Venlo. According to William McDonough and Michael Braungart, the founders of Cradle to Cradle, Venlo is unique. There’s nowhere else in the world with such a strong combination of education, industry and government all focused on Cradle to Cradle. And that has led to a lot of interest, both national and international.

More information

Venlo has a varied employment market

Finding good people is a vital success factor

The employment market in Venlo is very varied. There are people working in services, manufacturing and high-tech industry, transport and logistics, retail, agrofood, healthcare and many other fields.

The emphasis is on the spearhead areas of logistics, agrofood, and manufacturing and high-tech industries. There is ample availability of well qualified people in Venlo, from vocational and technical college education right up to graduate level. Venlo also offers a wide range of educational facilities, with the focus on meeting the needs of the spearhead sectors. And as well as a wide choice of educational facilities, Venlo has numerous companies and organizations offering HR and recruitment services.

Venlo’s educational facilities

Life-long learning in Venlo

Venlo offers educational facilities right up to university level:

• A campus of the highly ratedMaastricht University, offering courses that are aligned with the economy of the city and surrounding region.
• A campus of theHAS University of Applied Sciences, offering courses that are aligned with the agrofood economic spearhead.
• Fontys University of Applied Sciences, offering a broad range of courses at HBO (higher vocational education) level. This includes the Technology and Logistics Academy, as well as internationally oriented programs in English and German which attract large numbers of international students.
• All kinds of intermediate and lower vocational education. On the one hand these support industry, and on the other hand they offer a wide range of educational facilities for the people of Venlo.

Venlo is smart and innovative

Take industry… 
You can see how smart and innovative Venlo is on the Océ R&D campus, where hundreds of researchers and technologists work. Océ’s long-standing research tradition has led to numerous innovations and patents.

Take modern logistics... 
This isn’t just about transport and warehousing of goods, but much more about the management of goods flows. You’ll find all the required knowledge, expertise and innovative strength in Venlo.

Take agrofood… 
Here too, Venlo is a leader and innovator. Most people know that in regions with moderate and cold climates, horticulture takes place in greenhouses. But not so many people know that the Venlo greenhouse is the world’s most widely used type of greenhouse.

Venlo is a great place to live

We don’t live by bread alone

If you work hard, you also need to relax. Venlo offers plenty of ways to do that:

• Venlo has a bigger shopping center than you’d expect, partly because lots of funshoppers visit Venlo (including many from Germany).
• Venlo has a wide and varied choice of restaurants and other catering outlets.
• Venlo and the nearby urban centers have a theater and congress center, a popular music performance center and a range of smaller performing arts facilities.
• These include numerous active clubs and societies, hosting a wide range of events.
• Venlo is also a city of sports, with a wide choice of sports clubs and a professional soccer club.
• And Venlo is a green city in a green setting: anyone who lives in Venlo can reach the nearby nature areas within ten minutes by bike.