The State will grant a loan of 15 million euros to the Duralex glassware, suffocated by the explosion in energy prices, “to help it get through the winter”, announced Monday, November 21, the Minister of Industry Roland Lescure about Europe 1 .
waiting oven
The company had announced in September that it would have to put its furnace on standby for at least four months from November at its historic factory, located in Chapelle-Saint-Mesmin in the Loiret, and place all its employees on part-time jobs to save energy and preserve finances.
“I am going to tell them that the State is there and that we are going to make a loan of 15 million euros to accompany Duralex”, announced the minister who in the afternoon will go to the company’s website.
He mentions “a very strong impact of energy costs” because “to make glass you have to consume gas and electricity.”
“Duralex has had to close its activity for the winter, they continue to sell glasses because they have stock, but due to the rise in energy costs they are closing the oven. Those 15 million will literally allow them to spend the winter. This energy shock is really a brake on a company that was in the process of recovery, we want to support that recovery”, added Roland Lescure.
The famous glassworks had been acquired in extremis in January 2021, after being declared bankrupt a few months earlier, by International Cookware (Pyrex), which became Maison Française du Verre at the beginning of the year.
Created in 1945 by Saint-Gobain, the glass factory on the outskirts of Orleans employs 250 people and in 2021 had a turnover of 23.4 million euros.
In Gallimard, an energy bill quadrupled
During his trip, Roland Lescure will also visit the Maury printing house in Malesherbois – which prints weeklies (Paris Match, L’Express and Le Point in particular) and books such as those of the Gallimard publishing house and whose “the (energy) bill has increased from 5 to 20 million euros per year between 2021 and 2022”.
Roland Lescure indicated that Maury could benefit from state aid in energy matters “up to 12 million euros in total”, “or around a third of [sa] energy bill”, that is, two million from which the company has already benefited and “up to ten million” thanks to the meter authorized by the Government.
This help desk for the payment of the electricity bill for businesses opened its doors on Saturday for the months of September and October 2022.
Source: BFM TV
