The house that Henk built - ENG version

Interview with Henk Markerink, the multifaceted mind who directed the Johan Crujiff Arena in Amsterdam for 30 years

Second interview by Pravda Deportiva, also this one done on a beautiful Monday morning, in call, there is sun also on the other Teams box, from which Henk Markerink warmly greets me, the man who from 1991 to 2021, directed the Johan Crujff Arena, one of the most functional and modern stadiums on the planet, home of Ajax. He greets me asking if I were in Milan, I answer that I live in Calabria and from the terrace of my office I see a stretch of fields, followed by a blue sea and Etna in the background. And here we get straight to the heart of the matter, in fact he responds like this:I have never been to Calabria, but I definitely want to go, also because I am reading a lot about ancient philosophy and that part of the world has really played an important role. You know, I have always liked philosophy, and since I live between Istanbul and Amsterdam, because my wife is from Istanbul, I automatically compare myself with Greek philosophy on a daily basis. I also recently spent ten days in Sri Lanka, which is very similar to India, even though it is a mainly Buddhist place, but the Hindu influences are many and there are obviously also communities of Catholics, Protestants and Muslims. I find it interesting that they live in peace together, in fact I have not noticed any kind of animosity between them.

What is your main occupation at the moment?

I am the president of Sportstad in Heerenven, a multifunctional sports center, where the stadium is only part of a complex that includes a swimming pool, sports centers, a gym and even a hospital. The stadium has a capacity of about 30,000 seats, and the team is always in the middle of the Eredivisie. But this reality is an example of how a stadium should be composed and how much it can be the center of a company, because after all it is a small citadel, with its own micro-cosmos. Everyone uses this building: if you go there in the morning you find the elderly going swimming, the young people go to the gym, others attend a sports academy. So this building is always alive. I am the president, and I am also on the board of a large real estate company in Amsterdam, which manages assets with an estimated value of about a billion euros. And then I have a couple of other things in the museum and in the cultural heritage sector. For the Johann Crujff Arena, they call me every now and then for some advice, but I no longer have an official role. But I did it for about thirty years.

And for this you are part of the history of European football. What do you think?

Not really, but that’s okay. I’m trying to write a book about my journey at the moment. I started as a consultant on the project in 1991, and I retired in 2022. So it’s about thirty years of involvement. And I have to say, when you write this stuff and you look at the history around you, you think “we were the forerunners in this field”. In that sense, we took a new step in history, but I don’t see it as just my personal thing. It was a whole division of the club. It was the vision of the city, and of its leadership, so when I look back, I feel very privileged to have been able to lead the whole process. We did a lot of things that had never been done before, and when you do new things there is also the risk that things will go wrong: like the grass which was a problem at the beginning, and the acoustics, the logistics; man, the logistics of a multi-purpose stadium is something very different to a traditional football stadium. So we had a lot of, as we say, “childhood diseases,” that we grew out of. I’m honestly very proud of what I see now. That’s about it, but it doesn’t claim a place in the history books.

Everything was new every day, there was football, but also concerts, and the facilities, the expansion of the building and its innovation. We invested €100 million in ten years, we were always in action, and we had the money.

In a way you were lucky, because 1995 was the first year of the former Amsterdam Arena and it was also the year Ajax won the Champions League. You can't hope for a better start.

Yes. You have to be lucky in life. Sometimes there are people who are always unlucky and there are people who are accompanied by good luck. And in that sense, there were very fortunate circumstances during the construction, because at a certain point there was indeed a lack of money to finance the project, but we invented a model of shareholding in which other players could participate financially. Then Ajax won the UEFA Cup in 1993, the European Cup in 1995 in Vienna against Milan, and then in 1996 they played the final again in Rome against Juventus. In that heyday, people said "we want to participate in the new stadium", so everyone bought shares and it was a fantastic success. If these circumstances hadn't occurred, we probably would never have raised so much equity capital. So it was a lucky factor. Also, whoever you are, whatever idea or project you have, it's always important to have a good team with you, you can't survive with just a few concerts and, now and then, a national match.

One thing that really impressed me was studying the ownership model of the Johan Cruijff Arena. You explained that the owner is a company, whose main shareholders are Ajax and the City of Amsterdam. But there are also other investors, do you think this model can be exported?

Oh, yes, absolutely. And I am still surprised that this model has not been copied more, because it is a very solid way of financing such an expensive building. And we founded a consultancy company where I have dealt with about 30/35 projects all over the world, from China, to Brazil, to Qatar and Moscow and everywhere the question is of course "ok, the stadium costs 500 million euros, where do we get the money?" That is always the first question. Well, in some countries the state is predominant, and then they pay, as well as in cases where your client is a very rich club. But in all other cases, there is never enough money. And this model, where you contact society and the business world, and they all buy a share of the stadium and then you give them something in return, like free tickets or whatever, is a form of social crowdfunding which in itself, is a very logical system and adapted to contemporary needs.

Do you think it could be adopted by smaller clubs and in small cities?

Yes of course, even being in the third division, can be applied at all levels. The important thing is that the city also participates because the stadium is always something public/private. So you have to give your contribution from the city, to the business world, the citizens and obviously to the fans.Today in Italy there is a situation where every stadium stays open two days a month, just for home games. In your experience, why does it seem like people don't understand that a stadium should stay open, like for 20 days a month? I don't understand that either. I was a consultant in Italy with Andrea Santini. One of our frontmen in Italy. So we made a very nice plan for Venice, and we were in contact with Inter, with Roma, and Napoli. I mean, we had contacts with different clubs, and we always started from the idea of ​​multifunctionality. In these big cities, there is also a big market for concerts and entertainment, but still there is no progress in that sense. I think it has to do with the mentality of football, because it is so self-centered, they only think about themselves and the next match. But they are not able to see the moment. They say "if there is a concert, the grass gets damaged", there is a kind of mantra in which football has to be the center, and there is no space for sharing. Whereas if you really look at the business, it is a very logical thing to say, especially in the big cities, that the stadium is for all the big events and big concerts etc. Ajax was only 50% of our business, the other half came from big events, so financially it is like that. On the other hand, there is so much money in football at the moment that the big clubs say "well, we don't need these extra millions because we are rich enough. Our turnover is already 500 million, what is 2 million more". So, football has also become a bit arrogant in that sense.

It's strange because, especially in medium or small cities, the stadium is the largest infrastructure in the city. So why not use it every day? Why do you have to build a giant building and then keep it closed?

At the same time, you also see that the concert world that was more amateur, let's say thirty years ago, has become very professional with very few big promoters like the guys in the United States. Of course, a multifunctional stadium always has a lot of compromises, I mean it's not the solution for everything, you need a roof actually, when it rains you have to drain it because the acoustics have to be perfect, the logistics are different. So doing something in a stadium is sometimes difficult. In fact, a lot of the big organizers, they prefer to do big concerts in a park, where they can put hundreds of thousands of people, with a stage and all the temporary structures, which is often cheaper from a commercial point of view, than going to the stadium. In the meantime the big promoters, they are also investing a lot in structures all for themselves, I foresee a development in twenty years, where Life Nation and these kind of big players, will build some big covered structures, where Taylor Swift will perform thirty, forty times, and if you want to see her, you have to take a plane and go to Milan or Berlin or London. This could happen in the future, and big artists will no longer be interested in stadiums, they will simply develop their buildings.

Speaking of Taylor Swift's flights: last night was the Super Bowl, thousands of VIPs, politicians, even Trump, singers, actors, they all went there just for the game, leaving right after, each one practically on a different flight.  

Yes. This is a big conflict actually for all the big events where there is that amount of traffic. When the Rolling Stones arrive at the stadium, just for their structure they bring dozens of trucks for audio, lights and stage, then there is everything else and therefore the movement of vehicles and people is indescribable. As for the Super Bowl, it is an extreme event and the Americans do not care at all about climate change, that is: Trump. A president who mocks these arguments, and the Americans feel free to fly to buy a pack of cigarettes with a private jet for 3,000 kilometers. They do not care at all about air pollution. It is really a shame that so much energy is wasted for an event. But then there are artists like Coldplay, who are actually committed to reducing the carbon footprint in the organization of their concerts. We have done all sorts of things: like leading the audience to a few hubs and guiding them to the arena with electric buses, or letting them arrive by train and various public transport. But getting people out of their cars is not easy. There has been a growth in electric cars in recent years, which is already slowing down, and this could be a big problem.

You can put a lot of effort into sustainability and act on events, venues, etc. But you can’t control everything. So, for people who attend those kinds of events, it’s hard to believe in sustainability if I arrive by public transport while thousands of VIPs arrive by private jet. My action is useless. So, how can sustainability be more credible and less boring?

There is a need to think about a process that requires a long-term vision. You have to be able to think about your children and grandchildren, and think about what will be in 100 years, but that makes it a very abstract concept. If I'm hungry today I can't think about what will be in 100 years, so, the whole issue of sustainability and let's say controlling climate change, first of all it's a question of will, you have to believe in it, understand that we created it, and we can solve it. I have a technical background and I think that many things in the world are solved with technology. In Arena we started thinking about it in 2010 when this topic wasn't even a topic, and then we got to the point and said: "well, we are the first, and therefore we will be the first to change the entire energy plan". But outside our bubble we can't help but see how lazy people are, and as I said before, they don't want to change their habits. So, in our organization, I created an innovation center, which was separate from the daily business, where I put some people with a crazy and creative mind, and we connected it with the entire network of companies in our supply chain that wanted to feed it. Creativity and innovation organized, it was a success. But most people, as well as most stadiums and football teams are not organized. They think for today and tomorrow. I mean, football is also a very backward sport. They continue as they are, while the world is revolutionizing itself, they think of sustainability only as a cost factor, while if you do it well, you make money.

You said you were a former volleyball player, right? So, sports and architecture, your career is a natural consequence.

Yes. I have been involved in sports all my life, I was in the national volleyball team for a couple of years. So I had this sporting mentality, but I got into the stadium project by pure coincidence, I was not a specialist in stadium projects. So once I was there, I thought "well, I'll do this for five years, and then I'll go back to consulting". But then this project was so innovative, because it wasn't owned by the club, nor by the city. It was an independent organization. So I had all the space and all the freedom to develop it. So we started a consultancy, then a sustainability and innovation program, which brought continuous development that kept me very interested. It was all new every day, and so it was a world that never bored me. Then ok there was football, but also concerts, and the facilities, the expansion of the building and its innovation. We invested €100 million in ten years, we were always in action, and we had the money. We made a profit, so we could reinvest freely and that was such an inspiring process that I never had the feeling of saying “ok, that’s enough”. But now that I’m retired, I say ok, that’s enough, even though I look back with pleasure. I actually feel very privileged to have had this job. I mean, it’s luck. It’s pure luck. I see people sitting in an office until they’re 65 and just doing a budget plan or accounting stuff, oh my god. Luckily, I had a job like this and I could combine a few things, and keep my architect brain healthy. An architect is always designing in his head. Technical people are always creating things in their head. And then we technicians are people who are always moving towards a realization. We’re not just satisfied with the concept, we want to realize our idea. So that was an important aspect, but there are many others that helped me: the consultancy was a continuous source of information, which I could pour into Amsterdam. I was a sportsman, but I am also a fan of the Rolling Stones, Michael Jackson, Tina Turner etc. I mean, music is also a world you can never get enough of. The multiple form of my figure allowed me to be an entrepreneur in an existing organization by starting new organizations within it, and that made it interesting. And it is so unique. After all, sport is a unique world, as I just said, it is like religion, you can't explain it. It is not a thing like "I put a good manager in charge of everything and then you become a champion". No, it doesn't work like that. It works more like a clan. I often think about it from a more philosophical point of view. What are the points of success and points of failure in a football club?

Like do you only see the results or not? Antetokounmpo, in a press conference, after a blunt question from a reporter like "this year, you're not going to win the championship. So it's a failure for you." He answers "no. It's not a failure because I've improved myself. The team has improved. We can't win every year, so it's not a failure."

Well, it depends, of course, there are certain clubs, based on their status, that have to become champions. If Milan don't become champions, they have failed. And the same goes for Ajax. I mean, if Ajax are not champions, then we have failed, you have an internal war. It's a very interesting process. I've been watching this for twenty-five years with huge ups and downs and then I thought: where does all this come from?

And now, since you have so much experience, what kind of advice would you give to people like me who are starting a journey in the world of sport?

There is so much money in football, and you have to look at what it is giving back to the people, so pay attention to things like ticket prices. You have to have some kind of higher feeling and think that football is a very powerful tool: football can change the world. Football can make peace in the world. Football can solve poverty in the world. Football can solve maybe or contribute to climate change. In any case it should embrace these issues and act according to moral values. But if you do the World Cup in Qatar or Saudi Arabia, that is proof that you do it only for the money because everything else is wrong. I have been to Qatar, it is a beautiful place. Politically, we can discuss it, but it is a state the size of a province, which has no history in football. Idem in Saudi Arabia. So it means you do it only for the money. And that is something on the highest, more abstract level. Football is very important. I think, as I said before, that people no longer go to church, they go to a match, and it partly serves the same function. You meet your friends, you talk about the game, but you also talk about everyday life, so there is a significant social role. And as a club, you can also facilitate that. Be aware of that role and facilitate it. Then as a stadium, you can adapt so that people come earlier, stay longer, meet, have fun together and invest in that way in the social value. Also I think, as we started the conversation, the stadium is a very expensive building but it has a very limited way of producing income if you play 25 games a year, it's a shame. It has to be used every day. Clubs and stadiums should keep in mind that at least part of the stadium should be in use all the time. It should be designed and managed in such a way that people can use it as a town square. And in that way football can give back much more to society.

Once you get in, what is the world of football like?

Well, in football you divide into hardware and software. The hardware is the stadium and the software is the club. In a football club you have the specific functions that you also see in business, like marketing and sales, finance, marketing etc. Besides the core business itself there are many professions that you can do in a football club, and many clubs don't use enough professionalization. There is a big discussion now in Holland. Football has many aspects seen scientifically: the business, the stadium, the facilities etc. And therefore it is a big employer. When you study well from the scientific side, ask yourself "what world am I entering?" Because in the world of football one plus one doesn't equal two. Then you also have to study the spirit of football, the way it works, and that's something I learned from watching Ajax. That's not the logic you see in a company, sometimes you ask yourself "Oh, how is that guy managing all this? I mean, he can't even read and write". So, in any case, you have to study and deepen with scientific rigor the aspect of this sport that you care about and that you want to develop.

Do you still have any dreams, any goals to achieve in this new part of your life?

I hope I can write a book, things like what we are talking about now, are part of it. I would like to talk about the vision of the whole process. For me it is very important to understand how you go from zero to a finished building. The whole process is interesting, very complex and in the end what should the product look like? I think about things like “what is the ideal stage?” So these are the things I give my attention to and I am trying to look in which direction the future will go. But, well, if I can finish that book, I would be happy already. And maybe, okay, I am talking to several people in Europe. Maybe one day, I can be a consultant in a new city where my ideas can be put into practice. But I have not started a consultancy yet. I mean, I like to enjoy my free time and travel. When you are a consultant you have a lot of pressure, and I don't want that at all. I enjoy my hobbies.