The Royal Burger History

The beginning

In 1772 the name D. Burger was recorded in the annals of shipping agencies for the very first time. This happened when Dionijs Burger, the son of a sugar merchant from Rotterdam, joined the management board of a company ran by Frenchman Simon Micault. The company name – Micault, Manlove & Burger – was changed to D. Burger & Zoon in 1805 when Dionijs’ son Combertus became partner.

Tramp and liner services

In the first years of D. Burger & Zoon the only customers were tramp carriers with sailing ships which were chartered per voyage. In 1837 the company acquired the agency of a liner service between Scotland and England: the Gibson-Rankine Line. In 1850 the first steam vessel service from Tynes Tees Steam Shipping Co. Ltd. was established between Newcastle and Rotterdam.

Steam vessels were a big breakthrough for the entire shipping world and D. Burger & Zoon also benefitted from this success. As from 1850 many liner services with steam vessels were handled by the shipping agent. Dionijs did not live to see this as he passed away in 1834. In 1874 the 21-year old Willem Simon Burger left the company as the last member of the Burger family.

Old steam vessel S/S Iris

Around 1890 the company was located at the Westerstraat in Rotterdam, later it moved to the Willemskade and currently Burger has a large office in Poortugaal, close to Rotterdam. In 1910 approximately 40 persons were working for D. Burger & Zoon. In that year the owners of the company - the Crol family - asked Elisa Aalders – the son of a theologian from Amsterdam – to become partner. Eventually the Aalders family took over the property of the shipping agent and in the nineties the shares were sold to the Rotterdam Cornelder family; they still hold 70 percent of the property in the 21st century. The other 30 percent is in the hands of the Kanoo Group from Bahrein.

Head office Poortugaal

Representations

In the first half of the nineteenth century D. Burger & Zoon was not only a shipping agent but also a carrier with sailing ships. In 1880 it was decided to focus more on agencies and in 1886 Burger became agent for Fred Olsen, a company that Burger built a very firm relationship with over the years.
In 1906 D. Burger & Zoon obtained the agency for the Finland-Line. There were liner services from India and Pakistan to Rotterdam (carrier Clan Line), that were represented by Burger. Rotterdam to-Canada meant a Transatlantic service of the County Line, being a principal of D. Burger & Zoon. This interesting history now is the basis of the present day Burger Liner Agencies, serving 1,600 destinations worldwide.

Global footprint

D. Burger & Zoon were agents of carriers sailing the great oceans. In 1921 the Transatlantic services were expanded with liner services to the Saint Lawrence River and the Great Lakes. After the war, in the years of rebuilding, the shipping agent role also revived. All technological developments and inventions during the war caused a true revolution for the world of transport in the post war years. The introduction of forklift trucks and the use of pallets during the loading and discharging of vessels for example made the port throughput a lot more efficient.
In the following years, D.Burger & Zoon acquired many different types of carriers serving various destinations throughout the world. Also the tramp services still played a role during those years and D. Burger & Zoon were agents of sea vessels irregularly berthing in Rotterdam.

Travel agency and stevedore

On board the freight vessels to Norway and other destinations there was often passenger accommodation, for which one could book with D. Burger & Zoon. On a weekly basis some 150 passengers per vessel booked this; D. Burger & Zoon became a kind of travel agency. Remarkable is that, at the opening of airport Zestienhoven – nowadays called Rotterdam Airport - in October 1956 D. Burger & Zoon established a ground service and handling office for several liner services. Good to see is that in 2007 Burger Logistic Services opened a Burger Airfreight office at Schiphol, Amsterdam.
Throughout the centuries, the company was characterized by her entrepreneurship.
In 1930 D. Burger & Zoon established a stevedoring company in the IJssel Port on the right bank of the river Maas. The company had a passenger service – a travel agency so to speak – and on this pier they even built passenger accommodation. This service later faded away due to the emergence of the airplane.
At the end of the sixties the stevedoring company moved to the Friso Port, where later a special ramp was built for Fred Olsen Lines to discharge their vessels at the front, and for Tor Line a complete ramp was developed for roll on-roll off vessels. Eventually the area was sold to Furness (Seaport Terminals).

Containers

The use of containers also brought an important transition to the original profession of shipping agent. In 1973 the company Conva (Container Vervoer Agenturen) was founded together with Hoyman & Schuurman. In the nineties this became 100% D. Burger & Zoon and nowadays all activities are executed on behalf of Royal Burger Group. The division in the seventies between the agencies for conventional ships and container vessels was deemed necessary due to the procedures for the customers being different. The shipping agent’s focus is solely on the containers. In 1991 the Burger Group took over Euro Container Handling, a depot for containers in the Waalhaven in Rotterdam, existing since 1975. Conva had been customer with ECH from the start in 1975. Later, Burger sold this activity.

Take-overs

At the end of the nineties and the beginning of the 21st century a number of takeovers took place. Many were well established names such as Ruys & Co, Vinke & Co, Van Ommeren Agencies and Müller & Co. Initially these companies operated under their own names, but over the course of a few years the clarity in the market was deemed more important and therefore the name Royal Burger Group was introduced for almost all activities.
An overview of the prominent takeovers:
• Ruys & Co
• Vinke & Co
• Van Ommeren Agencies
• Trans-Maritime Freight Agencies
• Wm H. Müller & Co
• Teamwork Agencies
• Olie Scheepvaart Agentuur
• Dammers Agenturen
• Hudig International
• Trifor International Logistics