The Alinea brand will lay off more than half of its employees -

Damien MEYER / AFP

  • Alinéa will lay off nearly a thousand of its employees, or almost half of its workforce.

  • The furniture brand will be taken over by its own shareholders, thanks to a government ordinance recently adopted.

  • The employees cry out for the windfall effect and denounce an opportunist procedure.

More than half of the employees asked in a few days to pack their boxes.

This Monday, the Marseille commercial court validated the only partial takeover offer for the Alinéa furniture brand, in receivership.

This takeover offer resulted in the dismissal of 992 employees out of the 1,895 that the brand was born over thirty years ago in Avignon and whose head office is in Aubagne, near Marseille.

This offer, called Néomarché, only saves 9 out of the 26 stores of the furniture brand.

It was above all "the only possible alternative to direct liquidation", notes the public prosecutor.

And for good reason: the new shareholders of Alinéa, the only ones to become buyers, are also the old ones.

A government ordinance taken on May 20, in the midst of the economic crisis linked to the coronavirus epidemic, indeed allows until the end of 2020, business leaders who have filed for bankruptcy to present themselves as buyers if their offer maintains the 'employment.

A “Covid ordinance” at the heart of the recovery

However, on May 18, Alinéa joined the long list of stores that said they were hit hard by the collateral effects of the coronavirus, forcing them to legal redress.

The company had been declared bankrupt, and the only takeover offer came from the Mulliez family, already owner of this brand with stores throughout France.

At the time, the sign claimed difficulties linked to the movement of "yellow vests", to strikes against pension reform and then to the health crisis linked to Covid-19.

But the employees of Alinéa strongly suspect their management of using the current economic context and this new “Covid ordinance” as a pretext allowing to orchestrate a wave of layoffs within the company financed by the State, instead of implement a job protection plan.

"An obvious windfall effect"

“It's a total windfall effect, tackle Me Nathalie Campagnolo, lawyer for the CSE of Alinéa employees.

The Covid ordinance absolutely does not correspond to the situation of this subsidiary.

She encounters structural and not cyclical difficulties linked to the health situation.

The order was taken to deal with the health situation caused by the Covid epidemic.

It is absolutely not the economic and health story of Alinéa.

The difficulties have been recorded for several years.

There is an obvious windfall effect.

"

And to regret: “The group has achieved its ends.

In reality, when you belong to a group which keeps you in financial infusion, by definition, the group decides not only your life but also your death.

So, it's still easier to be the sole buyer of your business when you organize your state of insolvency over a period linked to the torments of the Covid.

I think the economic and social calendar for the Mulliez family was perfect, to be the only real buyer.

"

Reclassification offers

In its decision, the commercial court asks Alinéa to make "a point" on September 16, 2021. "It is a guarantee for those who remain with the current employer, wants to believe Me Nathalie Campagnolo, who does not however hide his fears for employees who escape this wave of layoffs.

This will encourage the group to be serious in this recovery.

"

In a press release, Alinéa "welcomes this decision, which will enable it to pursue the profound transformation of the company to ensure its sustainability".

“The management of Alinéa is deeply committed, beyond social and financial support measures, in favor of the return to employment of employees in closed stores,” says the company in this press release.

Several hundred job offers were offered to them, with more than 1,500 permanent jobs to be filled in various companies in the ecosystem of the Mulliez Family Association (Auchan, Decathlon, Leroy Merlin, Boulanger, etc.).

"The company promises" a complete transformation by 2023 "via in particular" the transformation of Alinéa towards digital.

"

Economy

Paragraph: How can shareholders take over their own business?

Economy

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  • Marseilles

  • Business

  • Reprise

  • Furnishings

  • Dismissal

  • Confinement