About Nico Daenens

At the age of 26, Nico Daenens had a late vocation and decided to take up a new study in the then fairly new field of facility management. During his internship, he endeavoured to work in as many different jobs as possible, from cleaning in hospitals to sitting in at boardroom tables. His internship period made Nico realize the general disinterest in domestic workers. To turn that around, he founded Dienstenaanhuis in 2004. Twenty years on and his brainchild has evolved into a group of companies with over 18,000 employees. His unwavering commitment to household helps remains to this day and he keeps striving to improve working conditions for all domestic workers. 

Cleaning is and always will be physical work, there is no way around that. But by expanding the type of services that can be paid for with service vouchers, a lot of household helps could keep working for longer. Clearly, keeping up the physical part of cleaning until retirement age is not an option for everyone. However, these household helps could still pick up children from school or visit seniors to lend a helping hand. This combination would be ideal as it creates employment and saves money on healthcare. That is why it is one of Nico’s big dreams towards the future.