You joined Alubat, as CEO, in September 2016. Can you remind us of the background to your arrival?
Christian Picard : Alubat was created in 1972 by Yves Roucher, with an innovative concept of aluminum sailboats which made the good years of the shipyard. Unfortunately, like many companies in the nautical industry, Alubat suffered a lot from the 2008 crisis, until it filed for bankruptcy. In 2013, a group of 14 shareholders, composed of Ovni owners and Vendée entrepreneurs, took over the company, keeping its former general manager, Mr. Aupinel, at its head. Some shareholders, clients of my brokerage business AYC, finally contacted me in the summer of 2016 to take over the management of Alubat, in order to revitalize the company and turn around a difficult economic situation.
Today, what is the status of this recovery?
It is well underway. We have order visibility for all of 2017 and are welcoming our first new employee this month. We are back to a production rate that we are happy with.
On which axes do you base your work to relaunch Alubat?
There are 4 priority areas. We are working on the offer, with in particular the launch of the OvniCat, on customer relations, after-sales service and quality.
The historic range is still very popular and we will release the 125th Ovni 395 and the 46th Ovni 445, models of remarkable longevity for a shipyard like ours. Consequently, the offer of second hand is important and the Ovni of occasions are the first competitors of our new sailboats. It is necessary to propose new models. The strong development of the multihulls in the sector of the boats of voyage and the attraction of the polar destinations, in which the robustness of aluminium is an asset, brought us to propose a catamaran in aluminium. The OvniCat 48, presented at the Nautic of Paris, received a very good response and we hope to release the first model in the fall of 2017.
The longevity of the Ovni creates a long-term relationship with the owners. We are therefore taking several steps in their direction, to pamper them. An employee, with 17 years of experience at Alubat, has been assigned full time to the after-sales service (spare parts and support for boaters) and refit. Launched in September, Alubat's refit pole has already handled the modification of 3 boats. We are also relaunching the owners club.
In terms of sales organization, are you planning any changes?
There are no major changes, but we must revitalize the network and rebuild our export network, which has suffered from Alubat's past difficulties. We also want to continue to develop direct sales to boaters, which is profitable for the shipyard's accounts.
What are your economic objectives?
We are aiming at an annual turnover of 3 Meuros. The ambition is not to return to 60 boats per year as before the crisis, but rather to make 15 well finished boats. The good recovery of the last 6 months makes us rather optimistic...
