NEWS FROM COMPANIES AND COMMUNITIES IN AUVERGNE-RHÔNE-ALPES

Near from Lyon, at the manufacturer of flexible pouche packaging machines Thimonnier, a large part of the production teams is fully comitted. We have to respond to the requests that have been numerous for several months: “Last December we recorded an order of 3 million euros for the medical sector in France, and another 3 million euros in March for Indonesia and Japan ”, explains its president Sylvie Guinard. She therefore reorganized the workstations to respect the barrier gestures recommended in the fight against Covid-19. "And of course we have stopped all the festive moments in the company," adds the manager, who today has a third of her workforce in the factory, half in telework and 15% on sick leave for childcare or disease.

Restart of Asia. After receiving orders placed from Asia at the beginning of the year, Thimonnier saw them return in March: "Asia is back! ", Estimates Sylvie Guinard who forecasts this year an increase in turnover to 15 million euros, against 13 million euros in 2019:" We maintain our objectives because we have a significant order flow ", she explains adding still having trouble projecting to Africa where the situation is more blurred.
In addition, Thimonnier put its factory to work for one of its customers in order to repackage more than 2,000 liters of hydroalcoholic gel in flexible pouches of five, two and one liters, in order to facilitate its redistribution in the context of current shortage : "We used the machines in our prototyping space," explains Sylvie Guinard, who will continue as long as the demand is there.

As a reminder, Thimonnier was born with the invention of the sewing machine ... in 1830! It specializes in the design and manufacture of flexible packaging machines for liquid, pasty or viscous products (milk packaging, bleach berlingots, fruit juice in pillow pocuhes, medical bags, etc.). The company regularly innovates
(Sylvie Guinard was appointed President of the INPI in October 2019). Recently, she developed a new shape of pouch for drinks without straws or caps.