Nièvre Merrain: an excellence production on a site reflecting history of the wood industry

The first sawmill to produce on the Nièvre Merrain site has been built by Alexandre Boulon as shown an advertisement published in the Guide touristique de Varzy (Varzy tourist guide) in 1923. A Journal du Centre press article published in 1955 corroborates the installation of this sawmill in Varzy: “Built int the middle of a densely wooded region, it was logical that the wood industry settled in Varzy. This explains why Alexandre Boulon decides to settle his mobile sawmill in this town.” Mobile sawmills were formely very common and they massively settled during first part of the 20^th century.

Afterwards, the sawmill changed ownership a few times: it has been named Dinot sawmill, then Dinot-Auclère, then Dinot-Anclère Montessus and then Montessus-Auclère around 1945. During the 1950’s, René Labbé bought the sawmill to produce parquet boards: “Parquet boards daily production is around 60m² and is sold in the Paris region where René Labbé sawmill’s head office was” (Journal du Centre, 1955).

Labbé’s sawmill is then bought by the Société Nivernaise de Placage in 1974 and is then operated, between 1980 and 1997, by Gatellier. Nièvre Merrain bought the Gatellier sawmill in 1998 and switched to a new production.

For 20 years, Nièvre Merrain has been producing on a site reflecting history of the wood industry and now excels, as the others staves mills of the Groupe Charlois, in the art of making French oak staves.