"We relive March 2020", alarms an event manager. Already severely affected by the pandemic, the sector has been experiencing an avalanche of cancellations in recent days, companies preferring to forgo seminars or festive end-of-year events in the face of the new wave of Covid-19. "We have identified 460 cancellations over the past two weeks, with a terrible acceleration this week, for services scheduled in December and January", reports Cédric Angelone, co-president of the union of events activities (SAE), which brings together 350 companies and 20 trades, on a very fragmented sector.
Communication agencies, hostesses, audiovisual, cleaning companies, security, caterers, decorators, carpenters ... The events make work a whole ecosystem of SMEs, already hard hit by long months of inactivity due to the crisis health and which owes its survival to state aid.
"We must realize the brutality of what we are going through: what industry can see its order book empty in 15 days?
“Asks the Marseille-based business manager.
Early cancellations
Updated Monday, the national health protocol in the workplace of the Ministry of Labor stipulates that "moments of conviviality bringing together face-to-face employees in the professional setting are not recommended".
If they are all the same organized, they must behave "in the strict respect of barrier gestures": wearing a mask, aeration / ventilation of the premises, distance of two meters when the mask is removed.
But while a strong rebound in the epidemic is underway in Europe and a first case of the new Omicron variant has been confirmed in France, companies prefer to cancel planned events out of caution, like BNP Paribas which has “completely suspended” the “face-to-face conviviality time” within its walls, according to a spokesperson.
Caterers in great difficulty
At the Caterers of France, which brings together the leaders of the sector, 37 companies with more than 1,500 employees, there is talk of a "new sledgehammer" for a sector "already severely affected" by the crisis. "In less than a week, more than 430 receptions for 155,147 guests were canceled, resulting in a loss of turnover of nearly 6.9 million euros", calculates the organization.
Based in Morières-lès-Avignon since 1959, the family business Helen Traiteur which employs 67 people against 87 before the crisis, saw half of its turnover in December and January go up in smoke compared to 2019, after a loss of activity of 85% in 2020 and 60% this year.
"For a week, it has been a disaster: we have lost signed business, and many others that were in the process of being so, such as greeting ceremonies that will not be postponed," says its CEO Eric Louis.
Deferral promises
However, a canceled reception affects a cascade of professionals: equipment and room hirers, food suppliers, launderers, decorators, florists ... as well as waiters and chefs employed as "extras", already very weakened by the crisis, who "do not" fail to regenerate their Assedic rights, ”notes the company manager, while the sector is facing a labor shortage.
Often, the client promises to postpone the event and demands that the service provider reimburse the deposit paid.
An SME which was to organize five events bringing together more than a thousand employees of a large company, learned of the cancellation of the last three, including one scheduled for the next day in Toulouse, after a crisis meeting.
His team, which had traveled 400 km by truck, slept at the hotel before turning around.
Asked by AFP, the Ministry of the Economy ensures that it is "in permanent dialogue with all sectors, particularly the most vulnerable".
"We have understood that this was the end of" whatever the cost "but our sector clearly still needs a hand-sewn", says Roland Héguy, president of the main union of the hotel and restaurant industry, Umih .
For professionals, the solidarity fund and partial unemployment thanks to which the event has survived, must be reactivated.
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