"Word of mouth"

In 1984, Didier Jolibois decided to work on his own. " It was a crazy idea. But conditions were favourable, because my wife had a job, and her parents lent me a workshop. To be self-employed, you have to be really strong. It's hard to work as a craftsman because it takes a long time before you can say that you have real and regular customers. And during this period, you can have to repay big investments " He says.

Without any advertisement, but with an efficient word of mouth, Didier Jolibois built his own clientele. To make a good restoration, Didier Jolibois uses to gather a lot of informations and to make researches. He doesn't use machines so much and preferes to work with old tools.

" Old tools are often more effective. And  it's also more pleasant to work with them. But it's not easy to find good ones. "

" Each furniture is unique "

If old tools are hard to find, the same problem exists for hardware products such as old keys or locks.

" The profession of restorer will always exists, but, at any moment, there will be a lack of supply. It will be harder and harder to find old harware products. Besides, this part of the job is exciting : recover old hardware products and be able to restore them.. This supply problem also appears for wood, because some kinds don't exist anymore. "

If the job he parctises still passionating for him, Didier Jolibois regrets that a few people want to restore their furniture themselves : " Often,  I see funirtures horribly restored. It makes me sad because it's the national heritage that's vanishing".

Happy in his workshop, Didier Jolibois is always stressed when he have a new furniture to restore : " Each furniture is unique. So the client have to find it again in a very good state. That's why I want to be more and more  effective in order to help in transmetting furnitures from a generation to another".