The glassmaker Arc France requests its placement in receivership | EUROtoday

Arc France, a big historic producer of glass merchandise in Pas-de-Calais for tableware, introduced on Wednesday January 7 that it had requested its placement in receivership.

This bicentennial group, which nonetheless employs 3,500 workers in Arques (Pas-de-Calais), the place its important manufacturing facility and head workplace are primarily based, has benefited previously from quite a few refinancing plans supported by the State, the final one a 12 months in the past. The Lille Métropole business courtroom should rule on this request for placement in receivership on Wednesday, the group specifies in a press launch.

This process is “the only legal and possible framework to allow Arc to adapt sustainably to a profoundly degraded market environment”estimates the final director of Arc France, Nicholas Hodler, quoted within the press launch. Despite yet one more refinancing and restoration plan validated in April 2025 by the courts, “our model must still be transformed in depth (…)by reviewing our industrial plan and therefore reducing our workforce”warns Mr. Hodler.

“There are several hundred jobs that are clearly at stake, it could be around 500 people”fears Frédéric Specque, central CGT union delegate at Arc France, interviewed by Agence France-Presse (AFP).

“We are invaded by Chinese products”

The market setting for Arc may be very tough, confirms this commerce unionist, between “the decline in consumption and the decline in purchasing power” and competitors, unfair in line with him, from merchandise imported from Asia. “The economic constraints are there: we are invaded by Chinese products which copy ours without the quality, but which are four to five times cheaper. So as long as we have that, we can make all the plans we want, we will always be too expensive”regrets Mr. Specque. “We would do better to put pressure on the government and Europe so that they finally put in place border protections and that we stop bringing in junk that comes from China or elsewhere”he provides.

Timothée Durand, member of a household of historic homeowners of Arc, the place he spent most of his profession till 2024, will current a takeover challenge for the corporate, the corporate specifies in its press launch, describing this provide as “serious” And “realistic”.

“The State will be attentive to the human and social consequences” of this new process for Arc, “in continuation of the support provided by the State to this group for several years”reacted the Minister for Industry, Sébastien Martin, in an announcement despatched to AFP. Mr. Martin plans to satisfy Timothée Durand on Thursday, he mentioned, whereas emphasizing that “the State will seriously examine” all different takeover presents prone to come subsequently.

Chronic difficulties because the 2000s

Founded in 1825, Arc notably produces desk utensils (glasses and plates) below its manufacturers Arcoroc, Luminarc, Cristal d’Arques Paris and Chef & Sommelier, but additionally entry-level merchandise for the Swedish furnishings big Ikea. But the group has confronted persistent difficulties because the 2000s: in twenty years, its workforce in Arques has been nearly divided by three.

In latest years, Arc has been hit laborious by the Covid-19 pandemic, hovering vitality prices and inflation, which have eroded its gross sales, and in addition suffered from historic floods in Pas-de-Calais in 2023 and 2024.

During yet one more rescue in April, a refinancing plan of 42 million euros was validated by the courts, notably with the arrival of two new minority shareholders. At the identical time, the State had granted Arc a brand new mortgage of 30 million euros and waived a part of its previous money owed, though it had already lent greater than 138 million euros to the group between 2020 and 2023.