With tremors in his voice, Eric Testeil, 59, stops to catch his breath. Five years after a fire ravaged the premises of the Toupnot company, giving his professional career an unexpected turn, this former employee still has not recovered. “I left more than thirty years of my life in the company. Then I had to find a job. It was hard, because I was no longer 20 », says Mr. Testeil, today a warehouse forklift operator.
Joining the corned beef manufacturer at the age of 17 and a half, located on 2 hectares in the north-east of Lourdes (Hautes-Pyrénées), he held various positions (unpacking frozen meat, maintaining tools, chef team) until his dismissal in May 2020. So, Thursday April 4 and Friday April 5, he will attend the hearings of the industrial tribunal relocated to a room of the Tarbes Chamber of Commerce and Industry. In total, there will be 54 former employees, out of the 72 employees at the factory, on trial to contest their economic dismissal.
Toupnot, a family SME created in 1932, changed hands when Pierre Franco, grandson of the founder, retired: from 2011, the manager gradually transferred the capital of the company to Rémi Arnauld de Sartre, who ended up by holding 75% in 2012. The rest is sold to Cofigeo.
Three years later, the agri-food group swallowed up the Louvre company entirely. The appetite of the specialist in canned cooked meals does not stop there: he gets his hands on William Saurin, with the approval of Bercy. On July 19, 2018, Bruno Le Maire, Minister of the Economy and Finance, gave the green light to this operation, on the sole condition of maintaining employment in the group for two years.
“It’s fraud, an absolute scandal”
In 2019, on the night of January 9 to 10, a fire largely destroyed the Toupnot manufacturing workshop. Once the shock is over, employees do not lose hope. Because, for them, the reconstruction of the factory can be financed by the 18 million euros in insurance premiums that Cofigeo receives. And then, a 7,000 square meter relay workshop is planned to save around fifty jobs. This project is deemed viable by the expert firm Secafi and the Coteaux de Gascogne Development Company. It is also presented to local authorities and elected politicians during a meeting in the prefecture in February 2019.
However, “employees don’t see anything coming”reports Me Elise Brand, seized by the latter in mid-2022. “And, on 1er October 2019, the group decided to close the factory. It’s fraud, an absolute scandal”, thunders the lawyer, who is demanding compensation for employees for the loss of their jobs due to the employer’s non-compliance with the agreement concluded in July 2018. For Philippe Combes, CGT union delegate, this is about ‘a ” treason “. “Management took us for rednecks from the South-West, except that the Toupnots are still there. »
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