Ady did well. This Occitan company, the French leader in the online sale of sewing and embroidery machines, experienced, then the start of the Covid-19 epidemic, considerable growth. If the “Do-it-yourself” has been in the air since well before the crisis, the virus has caused the sector to jump: the first three months of the pandemic, from spring 2020, the turnover of this company, born about forty years ago in the rue des Etuves, in Montpellier (Hérault), has multiplied by five, even six, rejoice Roch Fernandez and Claude Lestocard, the bosses. Over the whole of 2020, their turnover doubled.
“We have always been progressing since the launch of our website [Coudreetbroder.com] in 2003, says Roch Fernandez. But when the first confinement arrived, it was dazzling. It was the shortage of masks that first prompted the French to take the old sewing machine out of the attic. But also, to equip themselves. “Some have bought their first machine, others have re-equipped themselves with something more efficient,” explains Claude Lestocard.
“We anticipated a lot”
Until the global sewing machine market suffered a real shortage. But at Ady, we had felt this craze coming. “We anticipated a lot,” resumes Claude Lestocard. When the state started to talk about the interest of masks to fight against Covid-19, “it really exploded, remembers the entrepreneur. There, right away, we said to ourselves that we had to buy, buy, buy. The orders poured in, in Saint-Jean-de-Védas, where the company moved its showroom. “Even the carrier limited us! At ten pallets a day. We couldn’t send all the orders! “recalls Claude Lestocard.
And it’s not a fashion effect, assures the duo at the head of Ady. “It’s something very deep”, which also responds to the ecological desire to repair or transform, rather than throw away, assures Roch Fernandez. By the way, among Ady’s clients there are many young people. Not just old people. To respond to market growth, the company hired 9 people, and now employs 27.
Rue des Etuves, where Ady was born, Marie-Pierre Fourestier, the manager of the shop La mercerie, confirms this “boom” of sewing. For very long months, women and men, she says, have been flocking to her store to buy wool, fabric, threads, buttons or needles. And no doubt it will last. “We need to make things with our little hands,” says Marie-Pierre Fourestier. It started because we had to make our own masks. Everyone took out their sewing machine and said to themselves, “Hey, that’s not bad. It’s even great!” We took our old sewing books out of the closet, and we got back to it! “.