Is France’s bicycle sector on the street to a ‘Made in Europe’ comeback?

Decades of industrial relocation to countries with very low manufacturing costs have prompted hurt to many locations in France. In the modest town of Revin, closed outlets, houses for sale and industrial wastelands are just some of the signs of this decline.

But great news is on the horizon, a major bicycle producer has announced it”s coming back again.

Anti-dumping tariffs

The EU has legal guidelines to combat unfair level of competition. To far better safeguard industry, the European Fee launched anti-dumping tariffs in some sectors.

These tariffs are made use of to shield EU associates from foreign imports that they look at to be priced under good marketplace price.

Reviving a previous industrial town

The mayor of Revin, Daniel Durbecq, and the President of the municipalities association, Bernard Dekens, equally welcome this protectionist policy.

Dekens thinks that they will need to protect on their own, “it really is apparent that we simply cannot go on like this, providing our business to China and South East Asia”, he points out.

Durbecq agrees and tells us that in the 1980s and 90s, Revin’s population was 12 500, double what it is now. He also highlights the higher unemployment fee which presently stands at 27%.

The two of them are happy to see the historic French bicycle brand, Mercier, come again to France from South East Asia and settle down in Revin. “It proves that market is not useless in the Ardennes area and that it is attainable for a firm that relocated abroad a several many years in the past to appear again and to make in France”, Dekens adds.

Mercier’s strategy is to develop 50 % a million bicycles every year and start manufacturing subsequent yr. The 11 million euro expense to do so is seriously subsidised by French and European taxpayers.

A sector gateway

Nonetheless, many of the bike parts are nevertheless designed in Asia. That’s why the generation web site is shut to the ports of Rotterdam and Antwerp. It will give the organization uncomplicated obtain to essential markets.

Maryline Le Maou is a Senior Project Manager at Ardennes Enhancement. She tells us that this location is “shut to huge European countries, it’s the gateway to northern and jap Europe and a marketplace of 110 million folks”.

Generating positions

The new bicycle manufacturing unit will develop 270 work opportunities in the modest French town. Days after this news broke, the area job agency obtained hundreds of programs. A person of them was Stephanie’s.

She took us to an open working day at the unemployment office to examine out their modern recruitment process: task seekers’ abilities will be analyzed by simulating operate like welding.

Stéphanie tells us that “a good deal of folks moved absent mainly because of unemployment”. She hopes and expects that the factory opening “will deliver back very a ton of individuals”.

Some of the work seekers recall the web-site in which the manufacturing unit will be in advance of it grew to become an industrial wasteland. When the factory wherever Michael Brioso worked closed, his unlimited look for for work began.

He thinks the manufacturing unit will be terrific for him simply because it is really area, so he would not have to retain relocating around like he at present is with the temp get the job done he was capable to uncover.

Mercier is responding to a surge in European need for both of those standard and electrical bikes. But Jean-Marc Seghezzi, the CEO in cost of this return to France is not in favour of anti-dumping tariffs on nations exterior the EU.

“Anti-dumping tariffs are just a smokescreen”, he points out. He argues that it’s tough to embrace anti-dumping tariffs when 80% of their element producers are in Asia.

“I assume we actually need to look at how we can relocate that generation to Europe or how we can stimulate world-wide producers, Asian producers, to make them in Europe”, he provides.

A historic bicycle sector

Saint-Étienne was residence to France’s once-booming bicycle market. In the 1920s, countless numbers worked in the local bike factories there.

Joelle Virissel, the tradition mediator at its Museum of Artwork and Industry, is aware all about the increase and slide of the city’s industrial earlier.

She describes that the first French bikes were being manufactured there by the Gauthier brothers in the late 1800s and that’s when the city’s huge industrial lifestyle began.

Saint-Étienne was where by a multitude of thoughts was born, patents ended up submitted and equipment-changing inventions arrived to everyday living.

In accordance to her, “the 1920s ended up seriously the golden age of bicycles, but in the 70s, owing to financial improvements, relocation and expanding competitiveness from foreign factories, Saint-Étienne was not capable to hold up”.

Designed in France

But it really is not all poor news. A nearby start out-up called Simple Layout Know-how has honored and revived this missing area market with a bicycle made for households with kids.

Its co-founder, Patrice Faivre, suggests that they only get the job done with locals and so that has aided them to be “far more agile and flexible”. He thinks that if any modifications need to have to be performed “it’s less difficult to function straight with regional individuals rather of exchanging e-mails – and probably possessing to journey to factories in China, for illustration, to get the products manufactured”.

Gross sales Director, Thibaud Vignali points out that their most important objective is to make bicycles that are genuinely built in France at a price that is very similar to opponents.

Sky-rocketing transportation service fees, local weather considerations and shifting shopper routines blended with clever internet marketing and reliable industrial know-how have sparked this new European development. Highly seasoned gentlemen, like Hani Mohamed a welder at the startup, are driving this “made in Europe” accomplishment story.

He reminds us that doing the job with aluminum “is all about craftsmanship” and that it really is not effortless for every person.

Anti-Dumping tariffs – yay or nay?

Is this new increase in the bicycle sector induced by the requires of a increasing industry or did the EU anti-dumping responsibilities aid?

To Aurélien Bonnet, the Technical Director at Simple Structure Technological know-how, it is what aided the business make its decision to concentrate on developing regionally and within Europe.

As for Vignali, he is pleased that France and Europe offer this variety of protection for nearby industries. The anti-dumping tariffs are a single of the factors that have allowed Mounir, one of the company’s younger members of team, to just take a leap of religion and sign his initially long lasting perform contract with them.

Some welcome anti-dumping tariffs even though other people oppose them because of to their dependence on elements from Asia.

This big difference of viewpoint may perhaps result in bumps on the highway in advance.