“It was while passing in front that I had the idea”, says Bruno Paquet. Residing in Ardentes, he regularly passed in front of the former restaurant of the Forge de l’Isle. “I called the real estate agency and that same evening I visited the premises”, he continues. Salesman for fourteen years at the Bailly joinery in Déols, Bruno Paquet had want to start a business. “I wanted to move on, take over a carpentry business and be able to do things my way. The Covid period helped me mature my project”, he explains.
After a first project that had not succeeded, the idea came to him to transform this former restaurant. “It’s a very good location, there are around 14,000 cars passing by every day”, he underlines. At the beginning of April 2021, he left Bailly carpentry. “The deed of sale was signed on April 29, 2021 and I started the work on May 1”, he specifies.
Several months of work
The dining room, whose large bay windows have been retained, has been transformed into a showroom of almost 300 m2 while the kitchens have become a storage area. The overall investment amounts to 350,000 euros.
La Menuiserie de la Forge was supposed to welcome its first customers at the beginning of June, but the damage caused by hail pushed the opening back to the end of the month. It will be mainly aimed at individuals. Bruno Paquet will work with the Grosfillex brand, of which he will be the depositary. Fifteen projects are already scheduled. A installer arrives at the end of the month. The recruitment of a second installer and a part-time secretary are planned.
Bruno Paquet will start his activity in a context of rising material costs and longer delivery times. “It’s a new context, I’ve never seen this in fourteen years, he acknowledges. Some materials are very impacted like aluminum, others less like PVC where delays remain usual. We will have to organize the sites according to the availability of the products.”