On 20th September 2024, we celebrated EUROPLAFOND’s 40th anniversary.
It’s a milestone that deserves to be celebrated, especially as, in Brussels, few companies in our line of business can boast such longevity.
EUROPLAFOND was founded in October 1984 by its spiritual father Etienne WAUTERS and together with Jean SUAREZ, they worked hard to make this young company a success.
Sadly, our friend Jean, who was very active in the field as a true ambassador of our brand, passed away in April this year and was not able to enjoy this festive occasion which he would have loved.
He will remain forever in our memories and in our hearts and I really wanted to pay this small tribute to him.
We wanted to bring together our customers, subcontractors and suppliers in our offices and workshops to give them a better understanding of EUROPLAFOND. Unlike some of our competitors, we are not just a letterbox but a well-rounded company and a member of the Construction Association now called EMBUILD.
Over the last four decades, we have considerably improved our once haphazard infrastructure in order to create the working environment we are now so proud of.
Originally, EUROPLAFOND’s clientele was made up of independent general companies, but mergers or takeovers by major groups have made us change our approach and move towards a more direct one.
The acquisition of EUROCLOISON in 1998 enabled us to expand our service thanks to a complete range of partitioning systems, including monobloc, decorative, transparent, sanitary or even mobile systems.
As the exclusive owner and manufacturer of our systems, with the exception of mobile partitions, we have the kind of responsiveness and turnaround time that other companies can’t match. Of course, we still face competition from the major partition manufacturers, but in view of our overall productivity, we have nothing to complain about. We’re not specifically aiming for quantity; we’re aiming for quality.
When you have had the honour of creating the decorative suspended ceilings, plasterboard partitions and all the mobile partitions of the FEB – the Federation of Enterprises in Belgium – you can humbly boast about it.
As previously mentioned, we have the ability to successfully carry out a project from start to finish. In order to do so, we work with partners who have been loyal to us for many years and with whom we have completed wonderful projects, some of which you have seen for yourselves.
Over the years we have acquired an expertise that people in the industry have come to recognise, and it is true that before digitalisation, we were often called upon to provide advice and feedback to suppliers and manufacturers. Unfortunately, this era is now over but we still remain a reference in the industry. It should be noted that for over 30 years, again at the initiative of our founder Etienne WAUTERS, we also had an outlet for finishing products which enabled us to stay abreast of all the new products.
How does our organisation work? At an administrative level, either our secretarial department receives a quotation request or our managers are consulted directly. We then create a file number which will be turned into a site number. We have a programme that generates all the data entered into it. Each collaborator is then able to log in to the file that was created to draw up their offers, orders, correspondence and of course – last but not least – their invoices. The same applies when we have drawn up the plans that we submit for approval before production begins in our workshops.
Each product that leaves our workshops, whether it is the wood or aluminium workshop, is automatically given a dispatch note. Everything that leaves our workshops is thus correctly identified and allocated to the reference site.
Our subcontractors also receive a purchase order for each site together with an attendance sheet which they must complete and send with their invoice.
All this administrative work creates a significant but very necessary workload. Our external prevention and security service recently began to use our daily modus operandi as a reference and example to follow. We are very strict when it comes to absolute compliance with the regulations laid down by the authorities, which is lacking in some of our unscrupulous competitors.
EUROPLAFOND has its own workshops and a large storage area. Our stock of aluminium profiles, panels and fittings provides us with great flexibility.
In our wood workshop, we manufacture a lot of ‘door’ sets, we cut the panels used for our sanitary partitions and above all we can respond directly to requests from our fitters for various calibrated parts.
In our aluminium workshop, we manufacture our EUROCLOISON monobloc partitions, which leave the workshop already assembled, enabling them to be fitted with lightning speed. We also prepare the profiles for the transparent partitions as well as the profiles for the sanitary partitions.
In order to maintain this flexibility, we have a significant stock of aluminium profiles (+/- 20 tons), POLYREY panels for our sanitary cubicles, agglomerated panels with a melamine coating, multiplex panels for our wooden embrasures and pre-painted MDF panels used for sheathing, curtain boxes etc. There are of course all the screws, locks and fittings necessary for our sanitary cubicles.
We also have a stock of doors which have the advantage of fitting into our wooden frames as well as our aluminium and metal ones. This is one of our greatest strengths.
We also have a wide range of fittings for the manufacture of suspended ceilings using mineral fibre tiles, as well as for plasterboard and silicate fibre-based work.
For each project, we draw up workshop information sheets usually accompanied by dispatch notes.
As a member of the Construction Association, we are penalised by administration costs from which some trades are exempt as they do not belong to the same joint committee and we do not think this is fair. Like everyone else, we have been heavily affected by the COVID crisis and the war in Ukraine with rapidly rising prices, not to mention inflation
A lot has happened over the last 40 years, but we are still here to serve you to the best of our ability. A big thank you to all of our loyal customers and suppliers who have always believed in us and thank you for your continued flexibility.
Last but not least, we would also like to honour and thank Mr WAUTERS for his kindness in providing us with this wonderful tool.
Please take a look at some of the photos taken during this special day.
