Cémoi wants to separate from two factories in the Loire and Bas-Rhin

150 employees work in the Sorbiers (Loire) and Molsheim (Bas-Rhin) factories.

The chocolate maker Cémoi, faced with a drop in its sales, announced to the representatives of its employees that it was preparing to sell its factory in Sorbiers (Loire) and to close that of Molsheim (Bas-Rhin), which employs a total of nearly 150 people, we learned on Friday from management and a union source. The Catalan group this week initiated a staff consultation process with a view to the sale to its competitor Savencia of its Christmas chocolate and Easter chocolate factory in Sorbiers, the same sources said. The management indicates in a press release that the 122 employees of the Loire site, which it acquired in 1981, will be taken over by the Savencia Gourmet division of the former Bongrain group. “The operation should be finalized during the second quarter of 2023,” a union source told AFP.

The plant in the city of Saint-Etienne specializes in seasonal festive products, such as wrappers and Easter eggs, sold in supermarkets under its own brand and under distributor brands, as well as in assortments marketed under the Cheverny brand.

Closure in Molsheim

Cémoi adds that it will close its site in Molsheim, in the Bas-Rhin, specializing in hand-decorated moldings, which employs 25 people, and cut 30 positions in its sales department throughout the national territory. The management invokes the inflationary context and the fall in volumes on the confectionery market to justify its sale and adds that it wants to “focus on its historical know-how as a manufacturer of chocolate for industrialists and the catering trades and to continue to develop permanent brands”.

Cémoi employs 3,200 people, including 2,200 in France where it concentrates 9 of its 14 production units. It announces a turnover of 750 million euros in 2021, the year in which it was bought by the Belgian Sweet Products (which on this occasion became the world leader in chocolate under private label).