Christophe DEMASSIET

Christophe Demassiet, Managing director of Econox and AD Coup :

“I set up my first company, Econox, in Lille. At first, it specialised in the only bespoke container design for urban waste collection. When I decided to insource container manufacturing, I needed much larger buildings. Faced with the prohibitive prices in the metropolis of Lille, and because I am originally from Calais, I decided to prospect on the Opal Coast. I very quickly found the 5,000m2 building that I needed in the Bierne business park. It is located almost 45 minutes from Lille, not far from Belgium, Calais and Saint-Omer, just beside the motorway. The price for leasing buildings there is very reasonable. I also very much appreciated the welcome I received from the Hauts de Flandre Greater District Council and from Dunkerque Promotion. These two organisations did everything they could to ensure I got set up as quickly as possible and in the best possible conditions. They supported me in researching which funding and public aid I could access. Last year, to establish my presence in the area, I bought AD Coup, a neighbouring company I used to work with that was threatened with closure. It is a thirty-year-old company that has unique know-how in laser cutting and I didn’t want this know-how and the skills of its employees to disappear. It’s important for my own company but also for the territory of Dunkirk”.