Green jobs in the countryside

Creating “green” industrial jobs in rural areas: This is the challenge for Ulterïa Group companies. Alteria, located near Oxer in Yonne, was created by two friends who met on the benches of an agricultural engineering school, Alexis Nolet and Sebastien Becker. Initially, they dreamed of taking over the management of a business. “Then we had no environmental conscience”, Alexis Nollet agrees. In 2006, somewhat coincidentally, they acquired Mobilwood, an industrial carpentry company that makes certified and responsible wood shop fittings that employ about thirty people, particularly suitable for wholesale.

Everything in bulk

Starting with two people, gradually discovering the whole system and its challenges: selling products without packaging, in order to reduce the waste we produce every day. Mobilwood is gradually increasing its speed and is ultimately designed to scale and adapt to most of the organic and wholesale stores, furniture and components in France. Today, Mobilwood has 70 employees and is B Corp certified, awarded to businesses that meet certain social and environmental needs, as well as meet the needs of the public in terms of management and transparency. Henceforth, an endowment fund or “partner trust”, recognized in the public interest and operating in the name of environmental and solidarity change in the territories, would sell part of the capital of Alteria to Alexis Nolet and Sebastien Becker. Participates in the management of this financial institution and has veto rights over all decisions relating to its capital.

Beyond Mobilwood, Alteria has also grown through acquisitions and business creation, mainly specializing in bulk. The group now includes eight companies based in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, but based in New Aquitaine and Brittany.

“Integrated Ecology”

Ulteria now wants to create a genuine ecosystem with social and environmental values. The idea was born in 2015, when an American company offered to buy the company with the intention of establishing itself wholesale in France. “We almost signed the sale, Says Alexis Nolet. But this meeting led us to question ourselves about the meaning we wanted to give to our approach. With our growing environmental awareness, we wanted to continue the adventure, but by deepening it, with the aim of creating an ecosystem that is more virtuous than ever. “

It encourages them to engage in a process“Integrated Ecology”, That is, at the same time to take care of the environment, the economy and the community, the earth and the people who inhabit it. To implement it, the company acquired in 2017 a 10-hectare site in the village of Saint-Bris-le-Vineux, near Oxer, with the aim of accommodating a diverse population for coexistence and development. At this location, still under construction in 2021, we will discover not only Mobilwood’s new factory, designed entirely in the environment, but also the Montessori school that built Alteria, the permaculture farm, the goat farm and a “home” in 2017. Environmental Citizen ”was desired as the third place of ecological change.

Find out If not recorded on program and economic daysIt will take place on November 26 and 27 in Dijon.