Safety on the Construction Site: How De Rycke Reaches Mobile Workers

Safety on the Construction Site: How De Rycke Reaches Remote Workers Using WhatsApp Toolboxes

By Isabella Faber  |  12 June 2026

For concrete manufacturer De Rycke, safety is a core priority. Operating from three locations (Kallo, Kieldrecht, and Herdersem), this family-owned business has been supplying ready-mix concrete to residential, industrial, and road construction projects since the late 19th century. However, delivering critical safety updates to a workforce that is constantly on the move presents a major challenge. As one of the first companies in Belgium to partner with E-lia, De Rycke now seamlessly distributes toolbox talks, safety instruction sheets, and work guidelines directly via WhatsApp.

The Challenge: A Diverse, Fast-Growing Mobile Team

De Rycke is far from a traditional concrete producer. In addition to its permanent facilities, the company deploys temporary batching plants for large-scale projects, such as the Terneuzen lock, and even operates floating concrete plants for offshore developments like the wind farms on the IJsselmeer.

While managing fixed, temporary, and offshore operations makes De Rycke an industry pioneer, it also introduces significant communication and safety hurdles:

• Employees operate in constantly shifting environments with unique, location-specific risks.
• A large portion of the team—particularly concrete mixer and pump drivers—has no fixed desk and spends almost the entire workday on the road.
• Traditional, in-person toolbox talks proved logistically difficult and highly time-consuming to organise.

It is a challenge every company with deskless teams recognises: how do you communicate with employees without email or a fixed workplace?

The Solution: Leveraging a Channel Everyone Already Uses

De Rycke turned to E-lia to deliver toolboxes, safety policies, and operating procedures straight to WhatsApp, complete with interactive follow-up questions. Because there are no apps to install or login credentials to remember, updates land directly on the smartphones employees already carry. All engagement data is automatically tracked and accessible through a central dashboard.

The transition yielded immediate, measurable results:

• 95% of workers open the toolbox within 4 hours.
• 90% complete it within 24 hours.

“We used to struggle to reach and log everyone on time, especially temporary contractors and non-native speakers. Now, the toolbox goes straight to their phones, giving us instant visibility into completion rates. It provides incredible peace of mind.”
Omer Maes, Prevention Advisor at De Rycke

Beyond driving higher participation, this digital-first approach slashes administrative overhead and accelerates the rollout of urgent safety alerts.

Compliance, VCA, and Audits: Fully Accountable

In Belgium, the Codex on well-being at work and the VCA contractor safety certification expect businesses to brief their staff on workplace hazards regularly and verifiably. E-lia automates this process, making every training touchpoint centrally tracked and fully auditable.

Several E-lia clients have already successfully put this to the test during formal audits. Inspectors encountering the platform for the first time have been highly impressed by how digital toolboxes provide airtight, verifiable proof of compliance. Furthermore, granular audit requests—such as isolating data for internal staff versus external contractors—are effortlessly managed using flexible user groups and tags. This keeps the system audit-ready while remaining practical for complex corporate structures.

Digital for Scale, Physical for Substance

Transitioning to digital doesn’t mean abandoning face-to-face communication. E-lia supports hybrid setups by using QR-code check-ins for on-site meetings, feeding data directly into the same audit-proof reporting ecosystem. The real value comes from a blended approach. This allows De Rycke to maintain operational flexibility without compromising on oversight or compliance documentation.

The Next Step: Digitising Site Inspections

Spurred by the success of their WhatsApp toolboxes, De Rycke is expanding their digital workflow: site inspections will soon be managed and tracked through the exact same interface. This concentrates both workforce communication and field quality control into a single, efficient workflow.

Why does E-lia succeed where other tools fail? Because it adapts to the reality of the field: it is fast, mobile-first, and multilingual.

• Supports over 50 languages, ensuring that all personnel—including external contractors and non-native crew—fully grasp critical safety steps.
• Ready-to-go toolbox templates for instant deployment.
• Custom content creation tailored to your specific operations.

In a demanding, fast-moving, and highly mobile working environment—even out on the water—De Rycke has made safety simple, measurable, and future-proof.