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A passion for their art combined with a love of French life and culture has inspired three English couples to set up very successful businesses in France – creating ceramics, cookies and wine – for both the domestic and international markets.
And while their choice of small business may be different, they are united in their commitment and determination to succeed in their adopted country. They all decided to leave formal jobs to explore their creative side and have managed to find that elusive combination of a job they enjoy and a lifestyle they love.
Nigel and Suzy Atkins
The Poterie du Don started life with a romantic twist. In 1972 Englishman Nigel Atkins sold a camera to buy a house, a barn and 30 hectares of French wilderness in the commune of Montsalvy, lost down a muddy valley path in the Cantal department. Without water or electricity, the first few years were spent making the property habitable.
Nigel was a business manager and Suzy a secretary when she started pottery evening classes in London where they lived. She quickly discovered she had a talent for ceramics and their plan to create a pottery in France was born. Once Suzy had completed a two-year pottery course at Harrow Art College they headed across the Channel and by 1977 the Poterie du Don was a working pottery and home.
From the start the pots were designed to appeal to French housewives and to make a profitable business. Under American-born Suzy’s eye for quality and design, the business prospered and expanded, and a team of potters have produced the range over the years. The essential has remained the same; the pots are tough but elegant salt-glazed stoneware. With some 160 different objects even the most exacting madame can find what she needs.
Alongside the everyday pots, Suzy has made her name with her striking individual ceramics. They feature feminine touches of gold on the mottled surface. Her work has been shown around the world and she is a well-respected maker in the ceramics world.
The pottery has grown over the years into a successful business and outgrown their valley home. With an eye on their son Kélian’s future – he too is currently training to be a potter – they took the plunge to expand on a grand scale. After much hunting and paperwork a hilltop plot was found for a new building in the commune of Le Fel, in Aveyron, just a short hop into the next department from their old home.
The new pottery and gallery is Le Don du Fel. It’s a gallery, a shop, a working studio for four potters and an information centre. The building resembles five pottery towers standing proud on the skyline above the luscious green Aveyron valleys. It’s a remarkable combination of contemporary architecture and sensitivity to the glorious surroundings. The Atkins have created an outstanding ceramics centre and attracted local, regional and even national funding for the €1 million (£800,000) project.
Nigel’s pragmatic business sense has steered the project. As a businessman in France he knows that it is crucial to enter into the local identity and understand the allure of le terroir. A business must integrate into local structures and help promote that area of France otherwise you risk not having local support. He has worked hard to ensure strong links with the local community.
The Don du Fel is set to become an icon for Aveyron alongside its other famous British designed landmark, the Millau Viaduct. As a Frenchman said at the gallery opening: ‘You have to be an Englishman to do something like that in Aveyron!’
Laura and Marc Fereres
Making cookies comes naturally to an American. But to make them with the flavours of southern France and then sell as many as you can make to the French takes a lot of work, inspiration and guts.
Cookie d’Oc was founded in 2005 when Laura Fereres swapped her executive suits as European Marketing Director at Genesys Conferencing for the billowing aprons of a cookie maker. With two young daughters she needed a lifestyle change from the endless round of meetings and long distance travel. When she was looking for an idea for her own business she was also making cookies for the school fair. Compliments from children and parents convinced her that this was where her future lay!
Her French husband Marc then decided to trade his suit as Operations Manager at Montpellier Airport to work alongside her. They make a perfect team.
Laura and Marc spent a long time perfecting their cookie recipe. With a twinkle in his eye Marc told me there is a secret ingredient to ensure the cookies are exactly the right melt-in-the-mouth mix of soft and crunchy; but it remains a closely guarded secret. The ingredients are sourced as locally as possible: the flour comes from a nearby traditional miller and the Roquefort from a family business that has been running for five generations. These are cookies with a southern accent, or l’accent du midi, made in their home in the Languedoc. Oc refers to the regional language Occitan and the basis for the phrase langue d’Oc, hence Languedoc.
The flavours are a delectable combination of French
gourmandise and Laura’s American sweet tooth. There is something to please everyone. To name just a few there are fig, prune and lavender, dark chocolate, apricot and lemon, and even one packed with M&Ms for large and small children alike.
For those who prefer their nibbles on the savoury side, Cookie d’Oc make Roquefort or goat’s cheese and olive cookies. These miniature cookies are the perfect accompaniment to the quintessentially southern French apéritif and are regularly snapped up by gourmands searching for something tastier than the usual array of olives and crisps on the apéro table.
This summer the popular savoury range will have a new addition. It will be a yummy mix of sun-dried tomatoes and Mediterranean herbs, just right for the discerning palate.
Each cookie is handmade, one by one, in a true labour of love. Even with a high demand there is no compromise; in one week Marc and Laura once hand-made 40,000 cookies!
They work in a specially converted building beside their home in Argelliers, Hérault. Marc designed and built the kitchen to follow strict cleanliness and production processes. These cookies may be homemade but there’s no way they can afford to be amateurish in their set-up; they are consummate professionals.
Cookie d’Oc has made its name as an ambassador for the French-American culinary relationship and the cookies themselves are a tasty treat to look out for in the south of France.
Liz and Robin Williamson
For young wine makers, the Languedoc holds the perfect combination of excellent climate, affordable land and a wine industry without a staid image. It has shaken off its reputation for cheap plonk and is now home to many good, small domaines. The Domaine de Saumarez is part of this new wave – great wine, great location and run by an energetic young couple.
Robin and Liz Williamson left their jobs in the City of London, sold their flat and headed to the southern coast of France in search of a domaine befitting their plan to produce superb wine. After an intensive two-year wine studies course at Plumpton College, East Sussex, Robin was well prepared for the task that lay ahead.
The Domaine de Saumarez, near St-Georges d’Orques, fitted their requirements exactly having great terroir, meaning that the soil and position of the vineyards offers a potential for excellent wines. Never mind that the house was a burned-out shell. The soil offered what the Williamsons were looking for and the rest would have to follow.
They moved to France during the heat wave of 2003. By 2004 they were running the Domaine de Saumarez, installing new equipment and working their 11 hectares. With the sunshine and winds of the Languedoc on their side they are able to minimise chemical treatments. No herbicides or pesticides are used on the grapes and the weeds are controlled by simple methods; in winter flocks of sheep graze (and fertilise) the vines. Their wines aren’t organic but use the pragmatic method of lutte raisonnée (reasonable control).
Whereas before the domaine produced large quantities of low-grade wine for the local cave co-operative, now Robin and Liz produce smaller quantities of high quality wine. Using the existing vines, but working with labour-intensive methods, they have turned around the fortunes and reputation of the Domaine de Saumarez. Great wine clearly needs a great deal of tender loving care and physical labour. It’s certainly not an easier life than the City of London, especially with two young children in tow.
With a deft eye on flavour, they make wine they like and keep their range to just four wines: a rosé, white and two reds. In 2004, Wine Spectator gave their top of the range Aalenien ninety-two points, calling it a luscious red wine. Not bad for the first year! Robin and Liz limit their production to maintain the quality. This tactic is sound wine sense but limits the fortunes of the vineyard. There has to be a business decision about quantity or quality.
Image is everything, especially in wine. Robin and Liz commissioned an Italian designer to produce their eye-catching labels. These elegant labels, on tall bottles, stand out from the crowd, just like the Domaine de Saumarez wines themselves.
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