Toulouse. Midica, Intersport, Blackstore… Despite the crisis, this group is opening new stores
By Guillaume Laurens Published onNews ToulouseSee my news
It is a “regional, family-run and independent group!” “General Manager of Gefiroga, Olivier Garrigou, grandson of Marcel Garrigou, the founder of Midica, sticks tooth and nail to this triptych, which embodies the DNA and the success of this family saga for 75 years.
Despite the crisis, Gefiroga, parent company of the famous decoration store Midica, established since 1946 in downtown Toulouse, has continued to develop and create jobs. “We took a lot of the figure, but despite these two years of great violence, we have plenty of projects and ambition”, testifies Olivier Garrigou.
In addition to the Midica department store and its Gigiland restaurant, established since 2019 on the 4th floor of the building with a rooftop, Gefiroga now operates nine Intersport stores and two Blackstore stores.
The Covid, "a revealer of resilience"
"The Covid has been a revealer of the resilience of our group", even suggests Olivier Garrigou. Gefiroga took advantage of the closures imposed on its stores to renovate them, but also to provide training to its staff. Reception, preparation of orders on the Internet, merchandising, catering… “More than 10,000 hours of training have been delivered since the start of the pandemic to teams, in order to help them get through these difficult periods and come out of them stronger”. And today, he believes, "this has allowed collective emulation".
More jobs than before the crisis
Gefiroga currently has 370 employees, compared to around 350 before the crisis, even though the turnover, which stood at 60 million euros in 2019, fell by around 15% the following year.
And if the first waves of Covid had a huge impact on activity, the group has managed “since August 2021” to return to activity close to normal. Estimates for 2021 even allow us to hope for an increase in overall turnover, which could approach 68 million euros.
In view of developments and business projections for 2021, the group should have a workforce of 400 people by the end of the year.
The key, assures Olivier Garrigou, is an asset that the group “has never given up” for 75 years: independence. Gefiroga was able to count on public support and a loan guaranteed by the State of 4.5 million euros "which has been fully used", but according to him, it is above all "its financial autonomy which has enabled the group to resist the crisis, by preserving jobs” and even by hiring additional employees, with the opening of new stores.
A new Intersport in Mazamet
At Gefiroga, "everything is reinvested in the box", insists Olivier Garrigou, who owns the capital of the group with his father and sister. Result: despite the turbulence, the group made sure to continue its development during the crisis, half thanks to its own funds, the other half to borrowing.
On August 4, he opened the doors of his ninth Intersport. Located in the town of Mazamet (Tarn), on a former commercial wasteland rehabilitated next to Leclerc, this new store of some 1,700 m2 has created “14 local jobs”. It is precious, and it goes against "those who choose to desert rural areas and small towns to concentrate in large cities", raise the managers of Gefiroga, who make it a point of honor to "get closer of their customers.
Soon a new Intersport near Toulouse
But the development of Gefiroga did not stop at the capital of the Montagne Noire. Before Mazamet, it was in Bessières (Haute-Garonne), a town of 4,000 inhabitants north of Toulouse, that he opened another Intersport store. It was in May 2020, between two confinements…
And it's not over: in the next two years, he plans to open a new Intersport in the Toulouse area, where he already has four: Labège, Purpan, Rouffiac and Blagnac.
In the same logic, the group will double the sales area of its Intersport store in Cahors (Lot) from 2023 to reach 2,400 m2.
Two new Blackstores too
As for the multi-brand fashion brand Blackstore, after two store openings in Albi (Tarn) and Montauban (Tarn-et-Garonne), it is planning two others by the summer of 2022, "one in Carcassonne (Aude), the other in the region as well".
The opening of these various stores “made it possible to cushion the crisis and partially compensate for the group’s loss of turnover in 2021”.
Gefiroga intends to continue this expansion, always with a strategy of “territorial establishment close to people”, and “within a radius of two hours maximum” around the Pink City, epicenter of the group.
Digitalize trade yes, but through stores
Covid has also allowed Gefiroga to work twice as hard on digital. Initiated before the crisis, the digitization of commercial activity has experienced a dazzling acceleration in recent months. To be able to respond to “the new modes of consumption which today oscillate between real shopping and purchases or scouting on the net”, the group has changed gear in the face of online purchases.
Olivier Garrigou wants to focus on “marrying the two” and believes that “if we consider that our warehouse is the store, we only reinforce the latter”.
The rise of digital is especially felt within the Intersport stores, which are a cooperative of independents in networks. Here, it is not a national warehouse that serves online orders, but each store that is a member of the network.
"We have gained three years thanks to the Covid"
"Thanks to the Covid period, we have gained three years on our digitalization objectives", even tables Richard Hernandez, who manages the group alongside by Olivier Garrigou. Web turnover has increased from 300,000 euros in 2019 to a forecast of 3 million euros for 2021. Ten times more... "We had not measured this success", develops Olivier Garrigou. “Some of our stores now make 10% of their turnover on the web”.
Even Midica and its decoration catalog went online two years ago, at the same time as the brand was developing its deliveries in town. Since its renovation in September 2019, it has had a merchant site, where it offers a selection of products online, i.e. 3,500 references out of the 18,000 available in store.
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Intersport relies on its made in France bikes
Other prides of the group: making “increasing space” on the shelves for products made in France, alongside those imported, and putting a point of honor to "relocate as much as possible" its activities. Here again, Olivier Garrigou cites his sporting goods distribution brand as an example. While most of its competitors are currently experiencing stock shortages of bicycles at the end of the confinements, the network is supplied without too much difficulty by the Manufacture française du cycle, the last tricolor bicycle manufacturing plant in Loire-Atlantique, which 'Intersport bought – and saved – in 2013. With the key, “quick deadlines and local jobs”. It is from this factory that today 600,000 bicycles come out a year, the brand now owning two brands of cycles made in France: Nakamura, but also Sunn, bought 8 years ago at the helm… of the court trade of Saint-Gaudens.
Repurchased forests in the region, to eventually create his own wooden objects
After having worked for 15 years for the Ministry of Ecology, as an agricultural engineer, bridge engineer, water and forests, Olivier Garrigou took over from his father Roland as CEO of Gefiroga in 2017, but he has never forgotten his career and wants to make it a point of honor to "transform the group towards a better environmental impact". . In particular, Gefiroga entered the capital of BlueBees in 2018, the first crowdfunding platform dedicated to agroecology and responsible food, "which has to date made it possible to preserve more than 6,200 hectares of agricultural land and raised more than 9 €.5 million for ecological rural projects". In 2019, the group acquired 230 hectares of forest in Ariège and Tarn, and created "a company dedicated to sustainable forest management and wood production. ", Forega. "The ambition is that this wood will one day be used to manufacture the objects sold at Midica, to avoid international supply", develops Olivier Garrigou. The course is there, but the road is long: "From the tree to the table, there are many floors!".
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