Christian Burrus makes his dream come true
His brother, Jean-Paul, is a chocolate industrialist. Through his company Salpa (157 million euros in revenue and 650 employees last year), he turned the family business around and became the second French producer of chocolate for professionals, behind Valrhona. He also owns Chez Yvonne and eight other restaurants in Strasbourg, including Michelin-starred Le Relais de la Poste.
For both of them, nothing was decided in advance. Especially for Christian, the youngest, who quickly outgrows his parents’ obsession with cocoa. “At home it was clear that the eldest would take over. And that the others would be compensated,” says Jean-Paul. The family’s life revolves around the Saint-Dié-des-Vosges chocolate factory, the original stronghold, then Geispolsheim, in Alsace. The parents take their boys Jean-Paul and Christian and their daughter Laurence every weekend to wrap candies in aluminum. But it is only the elders who take over the business.
Geispolsheim factory (Alsace). As children, Jean-Paul and Christian Burrus came there every weekend to pack sweets. But it is only the elders who take over the business. Credit: SP
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Excellent in mathematics, the youngest has only one wish: to live abroad. He travels the world for American Express, then Oliver Wyman, and lives between London, Panama, New York and Lausanne. “I was about to make my dream come true,” recalls Christian. Under the radar. One day, in 1991, he received a call from his father. The subject? L’Esca, a small Strasbourg insurance company that fell into family hands by inheritance.
From shock to calling
With 150 million euros in assets under management, the house is a confetti in the insurance galaxy. “Either you take the company or I sell it,” says the father. At that time he becomes a father. The advice bores him; the challenge of being a boss fascinates him. He accepts. “We were brought up with the idea of transmission,” says Christian Burrus, who, at age 64, combines deadpan humor and an almost youthful embarrassment when talking about himself. “We are in the process of passing the baton from one generation to another. »
Time passes. Eight years later, he bought the bankrupt Alsatian insurance company Joliez Regol and devoted himself to the recovery of the company. That’s the shock. “I realized that Esca, which I had left for a year, had grown as much as the previous years,” he confides. I had spent eight years developing the company, but I had brought nothing to it. » Christian was then 42 years old. This overwhelming observation sparked his calling as a businessman. “I decided to withdraw from the day-to-day management and think about strategy,” he says.
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What follows is a series of strokes. He swallowed his competitors and created the Burrus group, today with around fifty companies and a large property portfolio, such as the Pleyel tower in Saint-Denis (Seine-Saint-Denis). But it was in 2020 that he achieved the biggest success of his career, merging the broker Diot, which he owns, with his rival Siaci, bigger but indebted and with a conflicting shareholder base. “He arrived as a white knight and dictated his terms,” recalls an insurance executive who knows him well. Today, the businessman who works without a secretary or a driver is out of sight.
Jean-Paul Burru’s success in chocolate
For Jean-Paul, it’s a different story. He was not 24 when his father called him to him. How can we as a “son of” assert ourselves against the omnipresent father? “We each had our own backyard: he, the arts and crafts engineer passionate about machines, me, for marketing and sales,” recalls Jean-Paul Burrus, who knows he benefited from a special relationship with his father.
The fact is that the production tool is aging and competition is increasing. When he took over the helm, aged 38, he was convinced of it. You have to master everything, from the cocoa bean to the shop in town. The new boss buys 380 hectares of orchards and hazelnut trees in Lot and large cocoa plantations in Ecuador.
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It supplies the 73 stores of Meilleur Ouvrier de France chocolatier Yves Thuriès and restores the luster of the Marquise de Sévigné brand. It is diversifying into tea, coffee and candied fruits. It modernizes the production system and increases the number of references for the flagship Schaal brand. He even opened the Museum of Sugar and Chocolate Arts. Years later, it is a success.
Jean-Paul Burrus modernizes the production system and multiplies the references of the flagship brand Schaal. Credit: SP
A taste for work, a family legacy
Today, the Burrus are mostly found in Verbier, Switzerland, where they share a large chalet – and 30% of the resort’s ski lifts. They also ask the question of transmission. On Christian’s side, it is his two daughters who are most interested. At Jean-Paul, his son led the foray into catering.
At dessert, the brothers remember their childhood. “Our parents spent their time working,” observes Jean-Paul. Raised in two different boarding schools, they got to know each other as adults. And noted with amusement that they equally inherited the same mania for work. A family trait.
