Boiron confirmed, on Wednesday, March 11, the fears of its unions: the laboratory announced more than 600 job cuts in France, about a quarter of its workforce in the country, putting this decision on the account of the decay of homeopathy decided by the government last year.
In total, 13 of the 31 Boiron sites in France will be closed, including the Montrichard factory (Loir-et-Cher), one of its three production sites in the territory, which represents a total of 646 removal posts, said the group, which presented the project to unions in the morning.
This plan, which will only concern the French part of the group’s around 3,700 employees worldwide, is necessary to “Perpetuate the company and secure its future and that of the remaining employees”, said the laboratory. “In this project, there are the creation of 134 positions, and a new organization of our commercial teams to be able to adapt to this new situation”, he said, adding that international subsidiaries are not affected by “This reorganization plan”.
Reimbursement to drop to zero in 2021
In detail, in addition to the Montrichard factory, 12 preparation-distribution sites will be closed: Avignon, Belfort, Brest, Grenoble, Limoges, Niort, Paris-Bois d’Arcy, Paris-Ivry, Pau, Rouen, Strasbourg and Toulon .
The Lyonnais laboratory, world leader in the homeopathy sector, described the risks posed to the group by the French government’s decision to repay homeopathy, while France represents almost 60% of its sales.
Since 1er January, homeopathy, which was reimbursed at 65% for a time, before falling to 30%, is only reimbursed at 15%. This rate will drop to zero in 2021. This decision was announced in July 2019 by the Ministry of Health, after a long controversy over the effectiveness of homeopathy.
This controversy had seen the clash between pro and anti-homeopathic doctors, a petition in favor of maintaining reimbursement with even 1.3 million signatures. At the time, Boiron had brandished the risk of the important social consequences of such a measure, saying that a redundancy would threaten 1,000 jobs out of its 2,500 in France.
There have been “A very virulent destabilization campaign for two years”, the company said, saying continue to “Do everything to obtain a moratorium and the maintenance of a refund”. The group, which is due to publish its annual financial results on Wednesday evening, has confirmed that it expects its profitability to drop in 2019.
Its annual sales from last year, already published, are down almost 8% to 557 million euros, even though the reimbursement had not yet taken place. However, with very little debt, the group had net cash in excess of 210 million euros at the end of 2018.
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