How did you start out ?

Cooked meats and pork butchery are a family business, starting with my grandfather, who used to slaughter pigs on Brittany farms for farm workers; then with my father, Paul, who worked on the markets for a long time before setting up his own company, Le Saloir de Josselin, in the Morbihan region (56), the kingdom of the genuine andouille from Guémené. A good ten years ago, we bought an old pork butcher building in Josselin, which we fully renovated and equipped to the latest standards to get the health and safety permits. We then bought another building in Sarzeau. These two sites represent a production floor of 1 300 m2 and our company earned the "Craftsman" (Artisan) label.

What do you produce ?

Our flagship product is the genuine andouille (sausage) from Guémené, the production of which is strictly governed by the specifications of cooked meat best practices. To be entitled to the "genuine" label, andouille from Guémené must be made in the Morbihan region, at Guémené-sur-Scorff or in the neighbouring towns. To make the sausage, we only use the entrails (large intestine or chitterlings) of pigs from Brittany. We only work with fresh chitterlings that we pickle in brine ourselves. The genuine andouille from Guémené is completely hand-made, using traditional methods. The chitterlings are salted and packed on top of each other (between 25 and 30) around a central part called the "core" (in turn composed of chitterlings cut into strips and assembled by string) then cooked in a bouillon (flavoured with straw) for six hours at 90°/ 95°C. To make a genuine andouille from Guémené (30 cm), you need three pig bellies because a lot is lost in the cooking. The next stage involves smoking the sausage over beech. It should not be too fat or too salty. Guémené sausage accounts for about 20% of our volumes. We also produce the 5A string-assembled andouillette sausage, for which we have been licensed since 2008 (only Brittany producer) and a complete line of traditional Brittany cooked meats (pâtés, farmhouse pâté with pepper, etc.) as well as other specialties like smoked filet mignon, or tongue sausage. We have about 75 listed products made by traditional methods. In addition to our usual clientele, we are also present on some markets. Our teams are young (average age 30), qualified and professionally efficient, with one quality manager (engineer) per site.

How do you see your development ?

Our approach is to propose top quality products and not to spread ourselves too thin by trying to do large volumes. This is why we only make 500 genuine andouilles from Guémené per day. We are growing, but we always try to control our production out of a concern for constant quality. The clients appreciate our products for their flavor, the simple way in which they are made and the good value for money. We plan to build another production unit by 2015, perhaps with new products, but keeping our base products and relying on our core business, which is traditional Brittany cooked meats, which represents a long history of quality and tradition.

What do you think of Rungis Market ?

We've been supplying Brittany cooked meats to Rungis Market for a good ten years, after buying Brittany pork there for a long time. It's a mandatory stopover for any cooked meats producer because Rungis is a huge market and a wonderful showcase in terms of quality products. It represents an important potential, in terms of volumes. You cannot survive without Rungis.