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Industry: 10 years later, the successful bet of the tea cooperative of ex-Fralib employees
Industry: 10 years later, the successful bet of the tea cooperative of ex-Fralib employees
(France 2)
10 years after taking over their factory, the former Fralib employees managed to set up their cooperative. At the time, the 34 workers, now all owners of their production tools, had seen the Unilever group relocate the production of Elephant tea to Poland.
They had taken on the challenge of becoming owners of their company, in Gémenos, in Bouches-du-Rhône, to save their jobs. 10 years later, the ex-Fralib are on the verge of succeeding in their bet. “It’s a struggle that has been very hard, like all struggles that are focused on the preservation and development of industrial jobs”, summarizes a former employee. Gérard Cazorla fought, 10 years ago, against the Unilever group’s decision to relocate the production of Elephant tea to Poland.
After three years of conflict, the employees took back the factory and imposed their project: the creation of a cooperative. “As we did not want to return to the capitalist system, where we had given a lot with Unilever, we were looking for an alternative to capitalism, and we found that the cooperative was closer to our values”, summarizes Gérard Cazorla, president, founder and administrator of Scop-Ti. The 34 employees are now all owners of their production tools.
