Mavic - A house call
From the outside, everything is going well at Manufacture d'Articles Vélocipédiques Idoux et Chanel. The new company building with its bold architectural façade sits somewhat elevated on the edge of Annecy near the Swiss border. The industrial estate has not yet been fully developed, allowing green meadows and the foothills of the Western Alps to be reflected in the geometric glass surfaces. A fleet of signal yellow cars is neatly parked in front of it, half-open roller shutters testify to the hustle and bustle.
From the threshold, visitors can see right up to the top floor, into huge, spartanly furnished rooms with floor-to-ceiling windows. Inside, people are sitting at long tables in front of screens - surrounded by large cardboard boxes and houseplants. A note is stuck to the reception desk: we should register via WhatsApp.
All cycling fans know that the black and yellow racing bike on the wall here is not just hip decoration. With this futuristic-looking Lotus, equipped with Mavic components from the wheels to the handlebars, time trial specialist Chris Boardman pulverised speed records in the 1990s. The bike is just one of countless milestones for a brand whose fame cannot be summarised in sober figures.
Many people think we are a global corporation
Mavic rims and wheels have not only been used by generations of cyclists and recreational riders. With the invention of electronic shifting and the system wheel, the French component manufacturer provided visionary ideas for the development of the racing bike - albeit not always with commercial success. However, the five black letters on a yellow background became world-famous with the bright yellow cars of the Tour de France's neutral race service, which helped to characterise the image of the race from 1973 onwards.
Michel Lethenet, a not very tall but dynamic man with a white goatee and an institution in his position with almost 25 years of experience, is responsible for the brand's public image. He cheerfully waves away congratulations on moving in: "Please don't be surprised, we've always been perceived as bigger than we are." This applies to the number of employees, development budgets, turnover, sponsorship expenditure and market power. "Because of our presence, many people think we're a global corporation."
It was good for his job for a long time, the brand was a PR self-runner. Looking back, Lethenet would still consider it good luck that the neutral spare racing bikes and hundreds of wheels from the Tour's Special Service Course are now spending their 50th anniversary not on yellow car roofs at the Tour of France, but between moving boxes in a garage.
It was so close!
Having to give up the tour was a shock, but only the beginning of an odyssey that would put the workforce to the test. Just one year later, the billion-euro Finnish parent company Amer Sports announced the sale of its Mavic shares, after which things spiralled out of control.
Over a coffee at the bar table in the stairwell, Lethenet gets the turbulent years off his chest. In his career, he has had to represent many wrong business decisions, whether it was unfinished products or incorrect assessments of the market. But what followed in 2019 was beyond even his experience. It is impossible to fully explain how the once seemingly untouchable traditional brand could become the pawn of opaque financial machinations.
The milestones of the drama can be read in industry news, but Lethenet conveys the real explosiveness: "So close," he brings his thumb and index finger together so that only a sheet of paper fits between them, "and we would have been completely wiped off the map."
Mavic - a new start with a scare
Then things get complicated, involving a US dummy company, disguised company figures, a hastily formed employee council, official proceedings, visits from supervisory officials and insolvency administrators, the full programme. Many of the younger employees left voluntarily, the organised redundancies followed a social plan and left behind halved departments, but with know-how. Lethenet could not be halved, he has always been the only one in his position and he is not big enough, he jokes. But you can tell he's not talking about just any business. The Mavic brand is also his life, like that of many of his colleagues.
He knocks on the table again and again, because for the hundred or so employees who could be saved, the trembling ended with a regulated sale and the right to have a say. The new owners, a pair of French investor brothers, are the partners of choice and are clearly serious. The workforce was increased, a new infrastructure was installed and a temporary production line was set up in the new building. The Cosmic Carbone Ultimate, designed when the shops were in a coma, is a lightweight wheel in a class of its own (see TOUR-Test 2/23).
Manufacturé en France
You can hardly hear or smell the production process. It's mainly manual labour, explains Sebastien Lejeune, the 32-year-old production engineer. They produce ten wheels a day. In addition to the technological fireworks, a small card that is attached to the finished wheels is important to him: Manufacturé en France, made in France. In the future, millions will be spent on attaching the label to all products, not only here but also at the historic Saint-Trivier-sur-Moignans site.
Along the way, we hear stories such as the yellow Mavic aeroplanes over the 1985 World Cycling Championships in Montello, Italy, much to the annoyance of the main sponsor and arch-rival Campagnolo. Or Mavic's coup of being the first western supplier to equip the Chinese track team together with Look. Mavic was often in the right place at the right time, trying things out time and time again; apart from frames and forks, there is hardly a bicycle product that has not yet been emblazoned with the Mavic logo.
The latest development is a compact electric motor for racing bikes, and the company is currently looking for partners with prototypes. Lethenet compares the company to a "never-ending start-up" - this claim has been used several times in the company's 130-year history, including today.
The complete contrast to Annecy awaits you at your destination. The industrial heart of Mavic beats in unadorned barracks, audible from the street. Aluminium profiles have been bent, welded, drilled and milled here since 1966. Inside, it smells of oil and chipped aluminium; it hums, hisses and squeaks, and at regular intervals there is a clink when a machined rim falls out of one of the machines.
Everything should happen here
The "Chef du Site" is Rodolphe Burnichon, a burly man in his late forties with his sleeves rolled up. He knows every nook and cranny here: the halls have been his second home since he was 20. He says that the pulse could be higher, the capacity utilisation is currently at a third. Nevertheless, he explains the path from the extruded profile to the finished rim with stoic routine and explains patented processes with which they have taken the weight-stability ratio of aluminium rings to the extreme.
Then he points to the empty areas, worn markings bear witness to the once closely-spaced machinery: "This is where we want to assemble wheels. Everything should happen here." A freshly refurbished, bright adjoining room with two container-sized milling machines provides a foretaste. Carbon production from Annecy is soon to come here.
Offices and meeting rooms are located under the roof, and the beat of the production line reaches the desk tops. After almost 50 years, investment is also needed here. Burnichon and Lethenet still have to pack leftovers into boxes before the tradesmen arrive. They know from experience that a lot can get lost during removals. Be it a yellowed photo, an old prototype or the scuffed eggshell motorbike helmet on the last cupboard.
Mavic - History in an illustrated book
1934
The production of aluminium rims begins and soon becomes the main business.
1979
Mavic develops its own mechanical shifting system and expands its portfolio to include almost all road bike components.
1992
The Zap Mavic System (ZMS) is the world's first electronic bicycle gearstick, its successor Mektronic (1999) already works with radio signals.
1994
Cosmic is the name of the first system wheel for racing bikes. Mavic continues to refine the concept and dominates the wheel market.
Mavic - History
Mavic's roots go back to 1889, when the brand emerged from a nickel-plating company (AVA) in Lyon following the involvement of its namesakes Charles Idoux and Lucien Chanel. The head of both brands was Bruno Gormand. This was followed by mudguards, toy cars and, from 1934, aluminium bicycle rims, which from then on formed the foundation of the brand. Hubs, drivetrains, pedals and gear components were developed in parallel. After the death of the founder's son Bruno Gormand in 1985, Mavic was initially managed by employees and then sold to the sportswear brand Salomon in 1994.
From 2005, both brands, together with ski manufacturer Atomic and electronics supplier Suunto, operate under the Finnish Amer-Sports Group and the headquarters are relocated to Annecy. Mavic perfects system wheels for racing bikes and mountain bikes, the portfolio is expanded with bike computers and a clothing line. In 2019, Amer Sports sells its shares to the US investment firm Regent LP. The sale is halted by French authorities following objections from employees, and the French Bourellier Group becomes the new owner in 2021.
Jens Klötzer
Editor
