On June 24, 2025, Maxime Villette and Robin Simard took over Menuiserie Olry, a family carpentry created in 1980 and managed for 25 years by Fabrice Olry. A year of restructuring, hiring and significant references.
It was not a continuation plan or liquidation, but a proper handover. L’company specializing in wood and wood-aluminum carpentry had gone through times when wood was obsolete, whereas today it is becoming an obvious choice in all public buildings – made of wood and aluminum. Maxime Villette, who joined Olry in 2018 by climbing the ranks to become production manager, felt this clearly. Robin Simard, who replaced him in 2024 as works manager.
The new management at Menuiserie Olry. © Olry
Historical monuments
Fabrice Olry did not leave them an empty shell. In 2011, 2.2 millions invested. In 2015 repatriation of the finishing and painting unit and extension of the company to 3,000 m2 for 800,000 euros, then new investment of 800,000 euros.
From 2013, Carpentry joined the eco-design support program “CIMECOLOR“thanks to which he recently developed “ISOLA” and “ISOLAFLAMM”a wooden door, passive and fire-ratedadapted in particular to the market of Historical Monuments and Buildings of France for which the company has developed a range of specific products.
Handover with Fabrice Olry. © Olry
An alert family business
HAS Mirecourt, in the heart of the Vosgesno PVC range. For pure aluminum requests, the site refers to Klein carpentry. There wood range is above all flexible. It includes a 90 mm passive type window with a Uw of 0.60, but without the PassivHaus, AIROTHERM wood and mixed label.
THE glued glazingthis is a possibility used in particular for the facade lot of the Rebecca Cheptegei sports hall in Pantin (for GCC). In terms of windows, Menuiserie Olry, which supplies professionals, sees the emergence of off-site integrations market in factory FOB and MOB. The works manager becomes an advisor on the integration of joinery into customer production lines. Change is radical, but never systematic. Flexibility always.
Integrate BSOs
For the moment, the catchment area is the Grand Est, the Paris region. AURA is under study. The target is trade companies or general contractors, such as GCC for which Olry also stands out in Sartrouville, as part of the new school campus.
The company’s workforce has grown to 27 people. A way of responding to a market that is evolving towards turnkey with demands that go beyond simple carpentry and include in particular the occultations, BSO, but also fittings.
The little celebration to mark one year of successful succession. © Olry
The fertile niche of wood-aluminum curtain walls
Curtain walls like that of the Pantin hall, Robin Simard would like to do two or three per year. A very technical site, however, with large windows, a facade coupling the efforts of a 42 m metal beam, the concrete of the cores and the wooden structure whose creep must be integrated. Olry Carpentry produces the spines and combines them with Raico or Stabilux exterior covers. The elements here provide self-support but not lateral bracing, which is provided in the case of Pantin by the large metal beam. Not sure that the architects who love wood are all aware, like Atelier RamDam, of the possibilities of architectural creation now possible with this type of solution. If the thorns tomorrow are in LVL, we will reach the limits of glazing manufacturing, unless we play the card of thin uprights that can also be made in beech.
The niche of large craft companies
At the start of the year, the company, winner of the Entreprendre Lorraine network in 2025, benefited from a zero-interest loan of €50,000 granted by TotalEnergies. But the main fuel of the future is the ability to seize the multiple market for wood joinery in its full scope and by meeting both the demand for expanded turnkey services and the delivery of products off-site. By seizing the specific opportunities that give a reason to exist to intermediary structures with fewer than 30 employees.
m / Jonas Tophoven / © Jonas Tophoven
