Ms Koers was unsure why the business was called Jeffrey Chandel and said her father for many years would answer whenever customers addressed him by the invented name.
The factory grew to employ 73 people at its peak including each member of his own family, becoming known as a leather specialist and taking on the export market. Mr Koers also built up a shoe factory, which he sold to Bata, which closed it in 1987.
Ms Koers said her father had been tireless throughout his life and "was a driving force as a father" and head of what became a thriving family business for many years.
"It's been said in tribute that he never stopped working, talking and thinking and that is just so apt, so appropriate, and describes him perfectly."
Over the years Jeffrey Chandel won numerous export accolades including the Air NZ Export Award, Peat Marwick Award, Malcolm Budridge Award.
Mr Koers described himself as a top salesman and was seldom shy about sharing his views on the New Zealand economy and its influence on business and the export sector.
He would often stir up editors and steal headlines with his opinions and in 2003 became a naturalised Kiwi in a ceremony officiated by then- Carterton Mayor Gary McPhee.
Mr Koers believed himself the only survivor of the old guard of manufacturers in Carterton and vowed clothing machines would never be exported to make cheaper, poorer quality goods in India or China, as happened to machinery from the Bata factory.
Mr Koers had six years ago started writing his memoirs, which captured some of his traumatic experiences as a child who couldn't speak until he was 10 years old, and times when like many Dutch, he suffered intense hunger during the German occupation of the Netherlands in World War II.
A funeral service for Mr Koers was held yesterday at the Richmond Funeral Home in Carterton.
