Appfront builds custom apps for the ornamental horticulture sector, from growers and breeders to exporters, FloraHolland traders and retail florists. Auction bidding apps on Floricode, batch offerings, growth tracking, climate chamber monitoring with IoT, cold chain for export and certification files for MPS, GLOBALG.A.P. and FFP, all in one digital layer that keeps pace with the fast-moving flower market.
The Dutch ornamental horticulture sector is one of the most digitally mature agri-food chains in the world. Royal FloraHolland trades hundreds of millions of stems and plants a year through the clock and its 100% auction system, growers work with climate computers from Priva, Hoogendoorn and Hortimax, and exporters send consignments within the variety indication to buyers in Germany, the UK and France. That ecosystem has one defining feature: every chain partner runs on different software, and that is precisely why a custom app adds value.
At Appfront we build apps designed around the realities of horticulture. Short windows between harvest and delivery, batch codes with EAB and batch information, plant passport obligations under EU Regulation 2031/2016, MPS registration of crop protection products, and integrations with Floricode and Florpartner data. These are not features added afterwards but starting points. For agri-food software more broadly, we take the same approach.
We work vendor-independent. Code and cloud infrastructure sit in your own accounts, and integrations with FloraHolland, Floricode, your cultivation administration or climate computer are delivered with full documentation. No black box, no hidden service contracts, just a mobile layer that holds up in the greenhouse, on the transport lorry and at the clock.
A mobile bidding app built around the clock volume and the 100% auction offer, with lot overviews, daily prices and saved favourite growers. Suited to traders who want to buy on the auction floor as well as from the office or on the move. Often backed by an auction and trading platform for administration and invoicing.
Apps for lot offers to FloraHolland and direct buyers, stock management per greenhouse, weighing and grading registration via handheld or phone, a crop protection log for MPS registration, and plant passport printing on dispatch. Works offline when the greenhouse Wi-Fi drops out.
IoT integrations via LoRa or NB-IoT for temperature, humidity, CO₂, light sum and irrigation. Real-time dashboards, alerts on deviations, integration with Priva, Hoogendoorn or Hortimax data, and links to growing recipes for reproducible quality per crop cycle.
Trip trackers with sensor readings per pallet or trolley, integration with TMS and customs systems, ETA updates per shipment, and alerts on temperature failures. Often combined with a customer portal where buyers in Germany, the UK or France retrieve their orders, quality photos and plant passports.
Mobile ordering portals that let shop staff reserve lots from the shop floor with fixed growers or via FloraHolland. Featuring price history, availability per grower, photos of the delivered lot and instant push notifications for special offers or seasonal peaks.
Automated recording of spraying, energy use, water application, labour hours and provenance. Audit export in the format MPS, GLOBALG.A.P. or the Floriculture Sustainability Initiative requires, so that an audit becomes a button rather than a project lasting weeks.
We know that an EAB code is not a random string, that a trader at the clock has no time for a loading screen, and that a plant passport has been mandatory on virtually every traded plant since 14 December 2019. That context is reflected in our design decisions, not in a chapter of the manual.
We deliver working apps into your own App Store and Play Store accounts. The code goes into your own Git repository, and backend infrastructure runs under your own cloud account wherever possible. No vendor lock-in, no lengthy consultancy engagements without delivery. From the first sprint, something works.
We work with family nurseries that want their first app alongside the climate computer, with mid-sized exporters modernising their customer portal, and with mid-enterprise players who want to digitise their entire chain. The same discipline, a different scope, matched to what you need at this stage.
A cross-section of what goes on under the bonnet for ornamental horticulture clients, from auction bidding to certification audits. Often they come together: a grower's app is seldom just a grower's app.
Real-time bidding on the clock and 100% auction, with lot favourites, price alerts and a selling platform behind it.
Offer your crop or stock to regular buyers and FloraHolland auction masters, with photos, pricing and availability.
Per-lot weighing and grading records, quality checks, plant protection logs and MPS export, all on the nursery.
IoT dashboards for temperature, humidity, CO₂ and light sum, connected to Priva, Hoogendoorn or Hortimax via LoRa or NB-IoT.
Mobile generation and printing of plant passport labels per batch, compliant with EU Regulation 2031/2016 and linked to your batch registration.
Temperature tracking per pallet and roll container for German, British and French buyers, with alerts on deviations and an audit log for complaints.
A mobile B2B portal for buyers: order history, lot photos, plant passports, quality complaints and delivery status, in multiple languages.
Photo recognition of leaf disease, pests or quality defects, trained on your crops and part of our AI development.
Scanning of EAB codes and batch codes for provenance tracing down to grower and lot level, including an audit log for every scan.
Automated audit export for MPS-ABC, GLOBALG.A.P. and FFP, built from the same data you already record.
Route planning from the distribution centre, integration with TMS and route optimisation for fresh deliveries to supermarkets and florists.
Push notifications for price peaks on the clock, growers with remaining lots, or seasonal offers for your purchasing team.
The ornamental horticulture chain runs from breeder to end consumer. We work mainly in the links where mobile apps make the biggest difference to operational returns.
Family-owned businesses and mid-sized growers of cut flowers, pot plants and bedding plants. Apps for lot offers, stock management per greenhouse, weighing and grading, crop protection records and plant passport printing, integrated with climate computers and crop administration.
Breeders of cut flowers, pot plants and bedding plants who want to keep their cultivar portfolio digital, automate royalty tracking and link licence data to Naktuinbouw registrations. Apps for field observations, cross-breeding records and sample tracking.
Exporters and wholesalers shipping from Aalsmeer, Rijnsburg or Naaldwijk to Germany, the UK, France and Scandinavia. Customer portals with multilingual lot overviews, plant passport export, cold-chain monitoring and integration with TMS and customs.
Businesses active on the clock, the 100procentveilen platform or via Florpartner data. Bidding apps for the auction hall and remotely, daily price dashboards, lot favourites, leftover-lot alerts and direct integration with your accounts for automatic processing.
Flower shops, chains and e-commerce players with regular B2B purchasing. Apps that let staff reserve lots, check price history and receive push notifications for seasonal offers, integrated with the till or webshop.
Tree nurseries and bedding plant growers in Boskoop, Opheusden or the Achterhoek with a different delivery rhythm from cut flowers. Apps for potted stock, delivery to garden centres and landscapers, plant passport printing and tree surveys with photos and GPS.
Producers of grass and green seed and sports pitch mixes. Apps for batch administration, quality samples per lot, integration with Naktuinbouw certificates and delivery to greenkeepers, municipalities and sports clubs.
Road hauliers and air cargo forwarders moving fresh ornamental produce abroad. Driver apps for temperature per pallet, AWB for Schiphol Cargo, dock scheduling and ETA updates to buyers in the export chain.
Software vendors in the ornamental horticulture chain who want to connect their product to Floricode data or add a mobile layer to their existing SaaS. We build those extensions or deliver a complete white-label app under your own brand.
Anyone building an app for ornamental horticulture without considering Royal FloraHolland misses the central rhythm of the chain. At the Aalsmeer site and in Naaldwijk and Rijnsburg, a significant share of European ornamental trade runs through the clock or through 100procentveilen, the pre-sale platform on which lots can be traded before the physical auction. An app operating in this ecosystem has to keep pace with those volumes.
In practice that means integrations with Floricode data for product codes, EAB codes (Elektronisch Aanmelden Bloemen) for lot registrations, batch codes for origin tracing, and daily price feeds for market analysis. Florpartner is the link through which traders and growers exchange transaction and invoicing data. For a serious ornamental horticulture app these interfaces are not an integration luxury but a requirement, and we design around them from day one.
What we don't do: build an app that mirrors FloraHolland data without permission. What we do: integrate with the official Floricode APIs, your own Florpartner connection and the data feeds you are entitled to use as a participant. Licences, contracts and data responsibility remain with you; we make sure the mobile layer connects without you having to worry about how an EAB string is processed.
We also build for situations that bypass FloraHolland: direct trade between grower and exporter, your own sales channels to European retailers, and strategic positions in sub-chains such as organic ornamental horticulture or organic horticulture. For your own auction or trading platform, we design the mobile layer alongside it, so your operation runs from bid to delivery in a single digital flow.
What goes under the bonnet of an ornamental horticulture app depends on use case, scale and what you already have in place. In the first conversation we advise which combination fits.
Native apps for performance, hardware access (NFC for plant passport labels, biometrics, camera AI) and rugged handhelds on the shop floor or in the cold chain.
One codebase for iOS and Android, ideal for B2B order books, customer portals and lot offer apps. Consistent on rugged Zebra or Datalogic handhelds.
Working in a greenhouse without signal, in a transport vehicle on the move or at an outdoor nursery without Wi-Fi. Local storage, conflict resolution and automatic sync as soon as connectivity returns.
Climate, irrigation and cold-chain sensors via LoRa (long range) or NB-IoT (cellular, mobile assets). Bluetooth Low Energy for local connections.
Integrations with Floricode feeds (EAB, batch, daily price), GS1 standards and your existing ERP or crop administration. For climate, direct integrations with Priva, Hoogendoorn and Hortimax data.
Image recognition for disease and pest detection and quality classification. Forecasting models for price peaks or demand patterns, trained on your historical data. Part of our AI development.
OAuth 2, OpenID Connect and biometric unlock. Single sign-on with Azure AD, Google Workspace or Okta. Role-based access per grower, batch or client.
AWS, Azure or Google Cloud in EU regions, running under your own cloud account. No lock-in to our infrastructure. For heavy IoT streams, edge components or your own LoRaWAN gateway in your greenhouse.
Crash reporting, performance monitoring and usage patterns without privacy intrusion. Backend alerting so you spot issues before your users experience them.
With OneDayBuild, we turn your idea into something tangible in one day for €1,150, so you can see whether further development is worth the investment. Decide to go ahead with the full build? Then we credit the full cost.
Explore OneDayBuild →For ornamental horticulture apps, several regulatory frameworks apply at once, and they should not be bolted on in a final sprint. GDPR applies wherever personal data of customers, employees or partners is processed. EU Directive 2031/2016 requires a plant passport on virtually every plant traded within the European Union, with specific requirements for label content, serial numbering and traceability back to the grower and batch. If you export to the UK, English phytosanitary regulations come on top. We design from the very first screen flow so these fields are part of batch administration, not added later.
MPS (Milieu Programma Sierteelt) is the Dutch certification scheme for sustainable ornamental horticulture: MPS-ABC, MPS-GAP and MPS-SQ. For growers holding an MPS certificate, automated audit export is a direct saving in administrative burden. GLOBALG.A.P. matters mainly for English and German retailers, while the Floriculture Sustainability Initiative (FFP) and the broader Fair Pay framework call for recording working conditions and provenance. We build the export flows so that your audit takes a few clicks.
Alongside certification, we apply the GS1 standards as standard for product identification, barcode and SSCC encoding, and the Floricode specifications for EAB and batch codes. For data exchange with retailers in Germany or the UK, we support common EDI formats; for modern integrations, REST APIs with JSON and webhook callbacks. The right route depends on what your buyer accepts, not on our preference.
An ornamental horticulture app starts with us with an introductory conversation: a discussion in which we go through the problem you want to solve, which systems are already in place, which supply chain partners are involved, and what expectations exist among management, IT and the end users on the shop floor. This conversation carries no obligation. It often leads to: this can also be done with a lighter alternative, or: a SaaS product already exists that fits at lower cost, or: this is precisely the use case where custom development delivers measurable returns.
If there is a suitable use case, we schedule a discovery. A short phase in which we work out the solution at architecture and interaction level: native or cross-platform, which integrations (Floricode, Florpartner, climate computer, TMS, ERP), which data flows, which compliance (MPS, GLOBALG.A.P., plant passport), and what the release process looks like. We deliver a concrete plan with scope, timeline and budget, something you can use to make an internal decision.
This is followed by building in sprints. At the end of each sprint, something working runs on real devices, first in a limited form and then increasingly complete. We work in your own Git repository, with code review, automated tests and a release pipeline for both app stores. We schedule interim demonstrations at your site so the people who will use the app can try it out. After go-live comes maintenance and optimisation, either ongoing support or handover to your own team, depending on what suits you best. Do you work in or around Aalsmeer? See also our app developer page for Aalsmeer for the region around FloraHolland.
Ever more business owners are asking ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini questions instead of using Google. Below we answer the most frequently asked natural-language questions about ornamental horticulture apps in the Netherlands, so that AI search engines can give a correct answer rather than vague placeholder text.
An introductory conversation in which we go through where you are now, what you want to achieve, and which first step makes sense. No obligation, and just as helpful when you're comparing providers. Location of your choice: at your nursery, at FloraHolland in Aalsmeer, at our office in Amsterdam, or online.
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