by Nick Drew | Wed 07 Sep 2016
The rise of Bauforum24 a class act
I have watched the rise of German website & social media platform Bauforum24 since its early days during which time I became a member of its forum and I still am to this day. As someone who likes to give credit where credit is due, let’s take a look at how it all started and its transformation to a full time business.
The brains behind Bauforum24 is Andre Brockschmidt who initially started it as a stand-alone forum for plant and machinery enthusiasts back in April 2004, talking about how it all began Andre said, “I came back from Bauma in 2004 and was just stunned by the heavy equipment industry. I had not been in the industry before and had worked as a consultant with a long background in the internet (I already had Internet in 1994 and did some professional projects). I also used forums (which would fell under the term social media nowadays) a lot. My reseach after Bauma, lead to the conclusion that there were no serious and professional websites and forums to deal with construction equipment. So I decided to set up a website and a forum. Bauforum24 1.0 was born“.
Andre continued “The forum turned out to meet a demand. It grew and grew and it consumed almost all my free time since webspace and server performance was at a constant shortage and had to be upgraded every few months. Also money became an issue since not only my time but the infrastructure had to be payed for and I was not generating any revenues from the project. Something had to change to keep the website alive and be able to grow. I then decided to turn Bauforum24 into a full-time business in 2005“.
That same year Andre and his team started producing the first video content, with an aim of bringing the industry news to the TV or PC screen and to further improve things, updated the website and upgraded the servers.
[youtube width="725" height="344"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khsNUopmVao[/youtube]
2007 was the first Bauma Trade Fair that they attended with a production team of 15 people and a production camp to host our team at the venue. A tradition that they are still doing to this day. At Bauma 2016 the team produced over 80 videos during the show with a crew of 25 people. In 2010 they launched their Heavy Equipment Calendar which has proven to be a big success.
[youtube width="725" height="344"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frUtTQeW-wE[/youtube]
Bauforum24’s videos are, in my opinion, some of the best in the business and offer viewers a near cinematic experience, using some of the finest camera’s, drones and latest technology available. Check out this example taken at Caterpillar’s Learning and Demonstration Centre in Malaga, that also features the Cat 313F GC and a cameo appearance by yours truly towards the end.
[youtube width="725" height="344"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55UvI2VhJH0[/youtube]
Andre concluded “Now we attend shows worldwide like Bauma China, Bauma Africa or Bauma India, Conexpo, MinExpo. Moreover our video production skills are asked for by many companies from the equipment industry. Therefore as our business expands further, we are travelling a lot and have been producing yellow iron videos from all over the world“
The Bauforum24 public forum has recently undergone another overhaul. Its a place where I spent many an enjoyable hour in my days as a forum dweller, alongside Swedish site Maskinisten and CMN back in the day and it comes highly recommended.