Angers companies are not always "maids in Angers"

"Made in Angers" is back. From February 18th to March 15th, the thirteenth edition of the event tries to reinvent itself through a focus on the jobs which raise work to art forms and another one about innovation. Innovation, incidentally, would be appropriate to give a new look to the event. That one gives more and more the feeling that Angers is indulging in navel-gazing. Would it be possible to open the scheme to somebody else than Angers inhabitants?

The mood of Angevins towards companies doesn't appear to have change funda-mentaly over the years. Even the authorities consider the entre-preneurs only through what these can offer : jobs, well before growth. And in Angers Loire Métropole, the website introduces the event through the phrase "100 boîtes" to visit, what looks a little bit nasty... ("boîte" has no equivalent in English). The job dating which is planned at the end of the event is praiseworthy, but is it efficient? And the president of Angers Loire Métropole in the leaflet detailing Made in Angers aknowledges that Made in Angers is the opportunity for companies to enforce their links with the territory. And what about the opposite?

Other perspective would be possible. The first one would be to give a wider fame to the event by inviting neighbours of other western cities to come. And why not from Paris, with tours around Angers? A second way could consist in turning Made in Angers towards professionnal circles : investors, managers from France or abroad. It's not good to walk round and round. Made in Angers could become mad. Some managers would probably think that their companies are sometimes considered as important, because most of the year, they are considered, through fiscal pressure, as "maids in Angers".