O“Shut up,” Richard Brandao, 57, who took over the Maugein company, already in difficulty, in 2013 with the help of investors, including French international football defender Laurent, told AFP by telephone. Koscielny, native of Tulle.
“Since Covid, it’s over. We were climbing back up until 2019, but Covid made us plunge,” he added.
Maugein, certified as a living heritage company in 2007, still had ten employees, the oldest of whom started as an apprentice 39 years ago. It was the last French artisanal manufacturer of accordions in a market dominated by Chinese producers.
A vain diversification
“Our only hope was to be able to enter the Chinese market, where the growth and interest in the accordion is the strongest, but we did not succeed. And this despite participation in the China International Musical Instruments Fair, the largest global event in the sector,” explained Richard Brandao to the regional daily La Montagne.
The manufacturer has also tried in vain to diversify, with the marketing of harmonicas, particularly over the past two years.
His disappearance comes six months after the inauguration of the City of the Accordion and Heritage of Tulle in the presence of the Minister of Culture Rachida Dati and the former President of the Republic François Hollande.
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