Last Updated on September 2, 2022
This list includes profitable businesses you can start or invest in as a small business in Netherlands. You can also read about small business ideas in USA, UK, Germany, Australia, and Canada.
The Netherlands is one of the most open economies in the world and one of the best countries in terms of technology and innovation. It offers excellent infrastructure, including Europe’s largest port, a competitive business climate and a well-educated workforce. The Dutch tax system has various tax incentives to encourage innovation and business activities, and as an internationally oriented country, the Netherlands is home to many highly skilled foreign workers.
According to the latest World Bank assessments, the Netherlands ranks 42nd out of 190 economies in terms of ease of doing business. This high position is due to the country’s advanced business infrastructure, strategic location, business climate, attractive tax environment, a small number of labor disputes and strikes, and a stable economy.
So if you live in Netherlands or you intend to relocate with the purpose of starting a business in Netherlands, then it might interest you to go through this article as you will learn about some of the most profitable small business ideas in Netherlands that you can start.
Table of Contents
30 Most Profitable Small Business Ideas in Netherlands
1 Start bicycle repair business
The Netherlands is known for its flat landscape, and for this reason, quite a lot of people make use of bicycles in the country. The Dutch are estimated to have at least 18 million bicycles. In 2013 the Netherlands together with Denmark were ranked by the European Cyclists’ Federation as the most bike-friendly countries in Europe. With that many bicycles, a reasonable business to start in the country is a bicycle repair store.
The business can be started and operated from a home based workshop. It has low initial startup investment and minimal monthly operating overheads.
The country has proven consumer demand for bicycle repairs that increases each year. You can make additional profit when you sell bicycle parts. This business is a part-time or full-time opportunity that has very flexible operating hours, and the repair skills needed to operate the business are minimal and can be learned very quickly.
2. Open a licorice factory
Licorice is the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra from which a sweet flavour can be extracted. The licorice plant is a herbaceous perennial legume native to the Middle East, southern Europe, and parts of Asia, such as india. The Dutch are the biggest licorice eaters in the world. They consume 32 million kilos of the stuff every year. This has shown that another good business to open in Netherlands is to open a licorice factory. Because the country loves this treat, you would never want for sales.
3. Open a souvenir shop
With Netherlands being a tourist destination, one profitable business to open in the country is a souvenir shop. This is because visitors to a particular area usually need souvenirs to take back to people at home or even as a keepsake to remember their visit.
Most popular tourist souvenirs usually found in the Netherlands include clogs (wooden shoes), miniature windmills, cheese, and tulips. You can set up your business close to a popular tourist destination so as to take advantage of visiting tourists.
4. Open a cheese factory
The Dutch have been making cheese since 400 A.D. In fact, the Netherlands is the world’s biggest exporter of cheese and its dairy industry is worth a mind-blowing €7 billion. This is one way to launch you into a very profitable business.
If you have been schooled in the act of cheese making and refining, you can source for a small loan that can enable you start a cheese making factory in the country. You will get ahead in this business if your products are unique and delicious.
5. Open a bacon factory
70% of the world’s bacon comes from the Netherlands. This goes to show that the Netherlands is biggest exporter of bacon in the world. I believe it would be smart to key into this yet viable business opportunity so as to make a name for yourself. If you do not have enough money to start a bacon factory outright, you can buy a franchise, or you can start other related businesses like bacon delivery, curing, etc.
6. Open a micro-brewery
Did you know that the Netherlands is the largest beer exporter in the world? If you are a craft beer hobbyist, it might be time to take your recipes to the next level. You could make unique beers and sell them at select pubs. The selling point for microbrewery is their emphasis on unique flavor, the quality of their beer and their brewing technique. You can grow to such an extent that you start exporting your products outside the country. This should not be difficult as there is already an established process for that.
7. Plant a tulip field
Tulips and tulip fields and flower bulbs are typically Dutch, yet tulips did not originate from the Netherlands. The first tulip bulbs were imported from Turkey to the Netherlands, where they proved to grow extremely well in Dutch soil.
Today, the Netherlands is the biggest producer and exporter of tulips in the world. One way to take advantage of the tulip business is to export your tulips. Yet another way is to make your field a tourist destination where you get to plant beautiful blossoming contrast of flowers that can get people to pay just to view it. There are a lot of such tulip fields in the country and they are making good income.
8. Start a tourism agency
With over 4.2 million international visitors, Amsterdam is now Europe’s 5th-busiest tourist destination. One way to take advantage of this yearly influx of visitors is to start a travel agency. A travel agency is a private retailer or public service that provides travel and tourism related services to the public on behalf of suppliers of such as airlines, car rentals, cruise lines, hotels, railways, travel insurance, and package tours. In addition to dealing with ordinary tourists, most travel agencies have a separate department devoted to making travel arrangements for business travelers.
9. Become a horticultural architect
Since Netherlands is big on the flower culture and making a beauty out of it, it would make you loads of money if you become a certified horticultural architect. You can help people design their gardens, their building landscapes, even their green houses. This is a very exciting business if you love to work outdoors and love working with plants. If you are really good with this, your finished work will always speak for you.
10. Coffee Cafe
After Scandinavians, the Dutch are the world’s biggest coffee drinkers. They drink no less than 140 liters of coffee a year on average. That’s an amazing 3.2 cups a day! This goes to show that you can never go wrong by opening a coffee cafe in Netherlands. Setting up a coffee shop in a busy area will attract many customers during office break times and in the mornings. You can add donuts, pretzels or bagels as coffee accompaniment, and to as well increase your profit.
11. Open a ski shop
The geography of the Netherlands is dominated by water features. The country is criss-crossed with rivers, canals and dikes, and the beach is never far away. The western coast of the Netherlands has one of the most beautiful North Sea beaches that can be found, attracting thousands if not millions of people every year.
To take full advantage of these water bodies, the most profitable business to start is to open a ski shop. This is a shop that sells skiing paraphernalia to the public. You can also rent skis and other things to add to your income. This business is ideal if set up on the beach, as skiing is likely to go on year round because of the friendly weather of the country.
12. Start a ski school
If you do not have the required finances to start a ski shop, you can start a ski school by the sea or any water body nearest to you. The only thing you need to start this business is you expert skills in skiing, and your ability to impact knowledge. You may also need to possess more than one pair of skis and protective gear. If people get to know that you are a professional at what you do, you would have no problems gaining and retaining clients.
13. Open a snackbar
In town centres, near public transportation areas or even in more quiet quarters you can find a snackbar, sometimes known as frituur or cafeteria in Netherland. These snackbars are pretty much the antithesis of high cuisine, but their snacks are considered typical for the country, and many Dutch expats miss them the most when going abroad.
These outlets are basically giant vending machines. You just slot in a euro or two and take out the snack of your choice. You can dispense snacks like Croquette, Frikandel, Kaassoufflé, Bear’s claw, etc.
The most popular snack is French fries, known as patat in most of the country and as friet in the Southern Netherlands. The “standard” way is to order them with mayonnaise. Other sauces are tomato ketchup, curry ketchup (unlike regular curry, tastes more like ketchup), Indonesian peanut sauce (satésaus), cut raw onions (uitjes), special (speciaal, a combination of mayonnaise, curry ketchup and optionally cut raw onions) and war (oorlog, a combination of mayonnaise, peanut sauce and optionally with cut raw onions).
14. Open a vegetarian restaurant
4.5 percent of the Dutch population is vegetarian and most restaurants have at least one vegetarian option on their menus or can make you one if you ask for it. Most Supermarkets sell vegetarian products or even have a part of their supermarket dedicated to vegetarian products.
But generally, finding a vegetarian option in a fast food restaurant might provide more of a challenge. Chip shops that sell veggie burgers are the exception rather than the rule; chips and kaassoufflés are often the only options.
This is a great business opportunity to key into as an entrepreneur. This goes to show that you would not lack customers if you open a vegetarian shop in Netherlands. Now may be the right time to fill in the yawning gap of lack of vegetarian restaurants.
15. Fitness/recreation business
Exercise has long been found to be the bedrock of healthy living, and almost everyone wants to boast of having visited the gym at least once or twice in a week. With this trend, opening a fitness center would surely pay you, and considering the high population of Netherlands, you may likely make a success out of your business if you have the right marketing strategies. To maximize your business potentials, you can make and sell exercise videos, or you can offer your services as a personal exercise coach.
16. Advertising and promotion
With a lot of big and small businesses in Netherlands competing for the market, a business centered on advertising and marketing would be quite profitable in the state. If you are good with putting up promotional materials that can draw people to the products you are marketing, then maybe you should set up an advertising service. The country is rife with small businesses springing up, and your services would be greatly needed.
17. Remote employee monitoring
Most employees need to be monitored before they can produce effective results. The interesting thing is that you don’t just monitor physical employees, you can equally monitor those that work remotely. Since the typical workforce is becoming more and more remote, so it then means that the remote employee monitoring service is booming. You can start this business and offer your services to organisations in Netherlands.
18. Healthy vending machines
The healthy vending machine industry is grossing over $42 billion because people now want to eat healthier. With about $30,000 to $225,000 at hand, you can become the operator/owner of a healthy vending machine franchise. This industry is still growing and it would not take much of your time because it is a mostly passive business.
19. Kid-friendly apps business
Tens of millions of kids are using smartphones and tablets these days, and there is money to be made from this. You can start this business if you know how to develop apps, or in the alternative, you can hire people who do to help you set up the apps. You may want to focus on health and wellness-driven apps first to get the parents on your side. Much later you can diversify into educational games and other stuffs that parents would be interested in getting their children.
20. Pet services
The pet industry is doing really well right now, and by 2019, the market is expected to hit $92 billion, and a variety of recent start-ups have proven that with a little innovation and niche targeting, you can make good profits in the industry. Your pet niche services could be training dogs, teaching parrots to talk, potty training cats etc. With the number of families that have pets in Netherlands, you would certainly make good profits from this business.
21. Home-Based Child Care
If you love kids, if you are exceptionally responsible, if you have impeccable references, and can handle high-stress situations, a home-based child care business may be an excellent small business for you to start. Many parents forgo commercial daycare programs or nannies, and look for home-based child care situations that allow their children to be watched in someone’s home with other children. This could be a great business you can take advantage of especially in Netherlands where parents don’t joke with the welfare of their children.
22. Ice Cream Shop Business
Ice cream is one of the most popular treats of all time, and it can also double as a very sweet business proposition in Netherlands. This is because the climate of the country allows for the consumption of ice cream all year round.
With enough capital, hard work, and the right ice cream supplies, you can make your dreams of operating a successful ice cream shop come true. Whether you will go the traditional route with scoops of ice cream or you choose a newer trend such as frozen yogurt, this small business is very profitable.
23. Fumigation Services
A typical agro allied related service business that an aspiring entrepreneur who is considering starting a business in Netherlands should consider starting is fumigation services. Fumigation is done to eliminate unwanted insects, weeds etc.
This business is easy to set up and you can equally run it from the comfort of your home. Note that you have to be knowledgeable about the various chemicals in use, and you have to apply and get the required licenses before you can be allowed to operate this business.
24. Plumbing service
In recent time, it appears that plumbers are difficult to come by; and a lot of countries, including Netherlands, seem not to have enough of this service. So if you are looking for a home improvement business to start in the state, then one of your options is to start a plumbing business.
It is almost general knowledge that you would need to acquire plumbing skills if you intend starting a plumbing business. You can comfortably run this type of small business alone, but if you are overwhelmed by demands, you can hire one or more employees.
25. Courier service
Courier and transportation services — both local and long-distance — are essential in any economy, because time sensitive materials always need to be transported from place to place. If you are willing to make deliveries in tight schedules, in all weather conditions and even on holidays, you can increase your chances of succeeding. Word of mouth marketing is a key element of growing this type of business, so make sure you ask for referrals once you begin to collect happy customers.
26. Laundry service
Everyone generates dirty laundry, and as such a laundry service is a good business to start anywhere including the Netherlands. This business, even as it is lucrative, requires very little startup capital and expertise. All you need to do is find a good location and gather the required equipment. Spread word of your business all over your neighborhood and you will surely get clients provided you offer quality services.
27. Recycling Business
A recycling facility engages in the recycling of materials such as plastic, paper and glass from waste locations. Once these materials have been separated and sorted, operators go ahead to refine them into useable products and then sell them to wholesalers as well as manufacturers. You can run a small recycling plant in Texas and where you can recycle either paper, plastic, metals or the likes.
28. Boutique
Part of the basic needs of man is clothing, and everyone has to be clothed no matter the season. You can choose to set up a boutique in the Netherlands and make a lot of profits. You can choose to go strictly high end in order to carve a niche for yourself because a lot of people can afford such clothes owing to the economic viability of the country. Also, you can go affordable, so that you can get the desired turnover that can move your business forward.
29. Open a Cinema
After a hard day at work, or maybe a tough working week, we all need places to rewind and recharge. A cinema is one of such places where people can relax; take their spouse or girlfriend to and a very good destination for family outings. Starting a cinema in Netherlands is definitely a business you won’t regret as long as you choose a very good location.
30. I.T Gadget Sales and Repairs
Look around you, almost everyone you see has a phone or two, including maybe a tablet and or a laptop. Now, phones don’t last forever and need to be replaced and repaired. Even if they do, everyone wants to use the latest iPhone or the latest Samsung series; which gives room for the phone seller to make money.