Present in 65 countries, the Gautier company manufactures 8,000 pieces of furniture a day in its three factories located in Vendée. Fervent defender of “made in France”, David Soulard, its managing director since 2010, perpetuates the anchoring of the family business founded in 1960, which today employs 750 people and generates 120 million euros in turnover. .
L’Express: While some companies are tempted to relocate, you make it a point of honor to produce in Vendée. Why this choice ?
David Soulard: This has been part of the company’s DNA since its inception. Very attached to this territory, my uncle Patrice, its founder, and my father Dominique, who succeeded him in 1999, have always wanted to stay there. In our business, we need to be reactive and rely on local skills. Like our employees, we work and live in Vendée. We defend collaborative, long-term entrepreneurship. Fifteen years ago, the made in France seemed outdated. But we were convinced it would work. With the health crisis, we realized that we were linked to each other. In Vendée, we have always been very united. This is one of the specificities of our territory, which has become industrialized in the middle of fields and farmers. Our business fabric is made up of large groups, such as Fleury Michon or Bénéteau, which employ thousands of people and also call on a multitude of local subcontractors.
At Gautier, “made in Vendée” also concerns supplies…
We control production from A to Z: all particle board is manufactured in our factories and the wood for our furniture comes from sustainably managed forests within a radius of 300 kilometres. We thus emit half the carbon and recover 50% of our old furniture via a network of recycling centres, before reusing them as raw materials.
According to you, the dynamism of a territory does not only depend on its reindustrialisation, but on its ability to innovate…
It is not a question of producing, as in Asia, furniture in large series and all identical. French industry needs to be more agile. We must promote technological innovation by investing in robots, without jeopardizing jobs. We have thus created a factory of the future in Saint-Prouant, with an almost autonomous line capable of manufacturing parts on demand. As a “learning” company, we encourage internal mobility by offering new jobs to our employees. Recently, two positions in the design office were filled by employees from production.
You are also an active ambassador of the “French Fab” in your region…
This movement, initiated at the national level by Bruno Le Maire in 2017, was led by our regional president Christelle Morançais. In Vendée, it federates 80 companies. Every quarter, we meet to imagine solutions to get entrepreneurs to work together, encourage vocations among young people and co-construct the industry of the future. We progress together and as a pack.
An article from special issue of L’Express “Find the city that suits you”