Robert Dekeyser

Despite his anger at the manner of his dismissal, Dekeyser was persuaded to make a three-game comeback for 1860 Munich when the replacement goalkeeper himself was injured.

He describes these as the "best three games of my career".

Robert Dekeyser (born 7 October 1964) is a Belgian-German entrepreneur and former footballer who played as a goalkeeper.

He is the founder of, a Germany-based manufacturer of outdoor furniture with distribution in more than 80 countries.

An outdoor enthusiast, Dekeyser is also the founder of DEDON ISLAND, a luxury resort in the Philippines.

Dekeyser was born in Leuven, Belgium, the eldest son of entrepreneurs who divorced when he was young.

Raised in Belgium, Austria and Germany, he recalls his childhood as "chaotic", leaving him with a deep-seated longing for harmony.

A self-described rebel and school truant, he turned to football as a source of discipline and self-esteem.

At 14, he won a talent contest, earning himself a place at the New York soccer camp of his idol, the Brazilian striker Pelé, whom he credits with encouraging him to "follow your dreams".

At the age of 15, having attended nine different schools, Dekeyser stood up in English class and announced that he was dropping out to become a professional footballer.

In 1980, at the age of 16, Dekeyser joined the Junior A-League team 1. FC Kaiserslautern as goalkeeper, staying with them until 1982, when he was called up for military service in Belgium.

In the late 1980s Dekeyser first began to develop his idea of an "outdoor living room", furnished with the attention to comfort, quality and aesthetics usually reserved for indoor living rooms.

Following his retirement from professional football, he worked closely with his uncle, an engineer and expert at plastics extrusion, to create a durable, weather-resistant synthetic fiber (known today as DEDON Fiber) with a natural look and feel.

Unsure of how to take his idea of the "outdoor living room" further, however, he put it on hold.

On his release, in 1984, he joined Royal Union Saint-Gilloise in Belgium's second division.

In 1986, on the recommendation of the FC Bayern Munich goalkeeper Jean-Marie Pfaff, Dekeyser was brought in as a replacement for the team's reserve keeper, who was sidelined with a long-term injury.

A year later he was transferred to another Bundesliga team, 1. FC Nürnberg, where he continued to serve as reserve goalkeeper.

After a season at Belgium's first-division KRC Genk, Dekeyser transferred in 1989 to TSV 1860 München, where he served as starting goalkeeper.

In his sixteenth appearance for the team, he was seriously injured by an elbow blow to the face and spent several weeks in hospital.

While in hospital, he learned from the newspapers that he had been replaced as goalkeeper.

Although numerous offers from first and second division teams followed, he retired from professional football at the end of the 1990–1991 season.

Dekeyser founded his first company, DEDON, while recovering from a facial injury in hospital.

He readily admits that he had no business plan or clear idea of what DEDON would do or sell.

His motivation was "to have fun working with family and friends", which he has since described as a motto of the company.

DEDON's first products were hand-painted skis, 80 pairs of which were sold, 50 of them later returned.

It was only after a stint selling raffia giraffes imported from Madagascar that the company changed its focus to outdoor furniture.

Then during a visit to the Cologne furniture fair in 1991, Dekeyser met a furniture manufacturer from Cebu, a Philippine island known for the craftsmanship of its weavers.

The manufacturer agreed to help him produce woven rattan furniture using DEDON Fiber.

Soon thereafter Dekeyser moved his family to Cebu where he spent six months developing DEDON's first woven products.

Upon returning to Germany he and his wife, Ann-Kathrin, purchased an old farm on Lüneburg Heath, close to Hamburg Harbor, where DEDON furniture would then be shipped from the Philippines.

In its first decade the company, which consisted of a small group of family and friends sharing business duties and chores on the farm, grew slowly.

A converted chicken coop served as Dekeyser's office.

Furniture deliveries were stored in the barn.

In 2000 DEDON opened its own production facility on Cebu so as to better control the design and quality of its furniture.

This, along with the adoption of powder-coated aluminum frames, the introduction of more contemporary designs, and the development of innovative marketing campaigns, helped DEDON to grow rapidly.

Over the next five years, sales increased by more than 1,300 percent.

Within eight years, the Cebu staff expanded from seven to 3,600 employees.

In 2004 Dekeyser moved the company headquarters to the outskirts of Lüneburg.

The headquarters, which included a facility for the production of DEDON Fiber, received media attention in Germany for their relaxed, family-like atmosphere and the many perks employees enjoyed, including billiards, yoga, sauna, gym and a chef.

Berlin's Der Tagesspiegel daily newspaper dubbed Dekeyser's emphasis on employee satisfaction, both in Germany and the Philippines, "The Bobby Principle".