Paul Ricard : Le Marseillais qui a conquis le monde avec son pastis – Documentaire Histoire – AMP

Il a transformé un simple apéritif en emblème national. Voici l’histoire d’un visionnaire français. 👋 + de documentaires histoire 👉 http://bit.ly/3lqyFpY 🙏 Abonnez vous !

00:00 – Introduction : Marseille et la légende Ricard
03:00 – Enfance de Paul Ricard à Sainte-Marthe
09:00 – Création du pastis et lancement de l’entreprise
16:00 – L’ascension fulgurante et l’expansion nationale
24:00 – Seconde Guerre mondiale : interdictions et reconversion agricole
32:00 – Le retour du pastis après-guerre
38:00 – Marketing, culture et héritage familial
45:00 – Les dernières années de Paul Ricard
50:00 – Conclusion : L’héritage d’un bâtisseur

Le pastis Ricard, créé en 1932 par Paul Ricard, un jeune homme d’à peine 23 ans, sera vendu dans quelques quartiers de Marseille avant de conquérir la France, puis le monde.

Aujourd’hui, plusieurs dizaines de millions de litres sont vendus chaque année, pour la plus grande joie de ses adeptes.

Ce film raconte le destin d’un entrepreneur exceptionnel et celui d’une boisson légendaire.

👉 A voir également sur Notre Histoire :
Chocolat Poulain : L’incroyable histoire de celui qui a révolutionné le chocolat https://youtu.be/xh6LCcv8GL8

👉 Découvrez notre playlist dédiée aux portraits de ceux qui façonnent l’histoire https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqKSNbk66i9l9w1ng0hEhYTlSoZY5i4gM&si=9MyY6CXwEbW9pknq

“PAUL RICARD, UN ENFANT DE MARSEILLE”
Réalisé par Eric Bitoun
©AMP

#PaulRicard #DocumentaireHistoire #Marseille #Pastis #Ricard #NotreHistoire #EntrepreneurFrançais #HistoireDeFrance #MarquesFrançaises #CultureProvençale

Do we agree or do we disagree?
We agree. Do we agree or do we disagree?
Open your hand. I’ll give you the one next to it,
it’s the 13 and 5 year olds. The 5 years make 14 and 5. There, plus 13, makes 15. And in your hand, you have the rest. The Old Port, the Marine Bar,
The Card Game. No doubt, we are in Marseille. But isn’t there
still something missing? Ricard evokes aperitifs,
parties, and friends. A drink for terraces,
especially in summer. Evenings with friends. The aperitif.
Yes, the aperitif. Yeah, the aperitif, that’s it. Comments on OM. Holidays, pétanque. The visit to Marseille, that’s it, the south. For us in Marseille,
it’s Pagnol and it’s Ricard too. Still, I think
everyone agrees. Whether it’s among young people
or old people, for us, it’s a bit of a
hallmark of our city. But one thing is certain:
in Marseille, it’s really anchored in our culture. No matter who, no matter the time,
no matter the place, if you say Pas staga, they say Marseille, right?
Exactly. Yes. Ricard is also a symbol of France
, so it must be said. Boy, a Ricard well done in the Marseillaise. A really cold Ricard is so good,
it’s so smooth when it slides. A very cold Ricard
is the king of Marseille pastis. Who remembers Darcélis, who, in 1947,
on the Old Port, sang his hymn to Ricard pastis. The great entrepreneur Paul Ricard,
whose story we are going to tell you ,
was particularly interested in cinema. Firstly, out of passion, but combining the useful
with the pleasant, he knew how to make it an excellent means of communication. Riquard, Riquard, Riquard, Riquard,
this is the real Patrick of Marseille. His inspiration leads him here to pay
homage to the Lumière Brothers, by filming the exit from the Ricard factory. Who could have predicted at that time that Paul Ricard would one day give his name to one of the largest alcohol groups in the world? But never equal and true, true, of Ricard, on July 9, 1909, in Saint-Mars, a small town which would later become
part of the Marseille agglomeration. At 28 years old, in 1937,
he was already an accomplished businessman when he bought the Château de Saint-Mars. He will make it his residence, his offices
and also his future filming studios. Welcome. Hello gentlemen. Hello Mr. Ricard. Mr. Ricard, the king of the past.
Mr. Brun. Are you looking for a small car? No, Mr. Brun, from Lian.
Nice to meet you. Mr. Brun, from Lyon. Sir, you will be happy
to visit your factory. But nothing could be easier. One of these gentlemen will accompany you. So. The story of Paul Ricard
begins in Saint-Mars in 1909. On this rue Berthelot,
where he was born. His father, Joseph,
ran a wine business there. Let Paul-Ricard tell
his grandson about himself. So here it is, Berthelot Street. And on the left, you see, in the hole,
there, between the two houses. Here. This is where my father had
his first house built. Finally,
the first house where he made the wine, on the ground floor,
is where I was raised. The world has changed a lot since then, you know. That world was closer to the world
of Antiquity and the Middle Ages than the one you live in now. Still on rue Berthelot and adjoining
the birthplace of Paul Ricard, is the Sainte-Marthe circle,
a very important place for social ties between the people of Saint-Martois. Created in 1890, it took on even greater
importance during the time when the Ricard factory was located next door,
until 2021. It has since lost the attendance
of the factory employees, and the circle is certainly still there,
but now orphaned, mourning a bygone era and
now living in the memory of the venerated figure of Paul Ricard. Paul Ricard and he, his affectionate,
was the Saint-Mars circle. Moreover, he was president
of the Saint-Mars circle at its beginnings. He always… The circle was his fiefdom. The Saint-Mars circle and Saint-Mars would
never have had the hora they saw without Paul Ricard, because Paul Ricard
was known throughout the world. Paul Ricard was born there,
in number 4 of Bouloire in Toulouse. And the Ricard company was created there. So, for us, it was unimaginable
that the Ricard name would leave Saint-Mars. It was unimaginable. It wasn’t Mr.
Arnaud or who was Épino, it was Mr. Paul Ricard. Very attached to his
neighborhood friends and his neighborhood. And we, Saint-Mars-Toy, will
always have Paul Ricard in our hearts. Boy, a Ricard. And it was Mr. Ricard
who built all this? Yes, it was Mr.
Ricard who built this. And since you’ve been good, I
‘m going to tell you his fabulous story. Once upon a time, in Sainte-Marte,
near Marseille, while finally negotiating. On Sundays, he traveled through the
Provençal countryside to visit the vineyards and choose the wines he needed. He had two children, Paul and Pierre. And in the summer he brought them with him,
first to amuse and distract them, but also
to give them a change of scenery. The father figure of Joseph Ricard will
weigh heavily on Paul’s vocation. A wine merchant, he shares
his passion with his two sons. He himself makes a vermut,
the vermut of Father Ricard, of which he is also a distributor. A few years later,
it allowed Paul to distill his own alcohol and thus
develop the pastis that would make his fortune. From one. When the First World War
broke out, Paul Richard was 5 years old. Despite his young age,
this period would shape his mind. One day, I
was at school, I was nine years old. There is the baker who carried
the bread with his horse, who enters the school and who enters
the classroom, who says: Mr. Simeon, I have come to get the little ones
to ring the bells. The war is over. Then
the schoolmaster who had lost his brother in the war
said: My children, you can never forget
those who will not return. And his brother, his brother had disappeared
in the war, he had been killed, we don’t know where. The war is over. I was going to say: It’s the end of the war. So it became a big party. It was a terrible, terrible party. Everyone was kissing each other in the streets. There are many who did
not return, who died. They went to war,
they were killed. And your father?
My father? My father did not go to war
because he had a disability in his legs, he could not walk well. He had phlebitis. With my grandparents,
he went to Beaucet every Sunday. My grandparents had a friend
named Espanay, who was a former hairdresser and who was
a bit of a poacher and who made his own pastis, like everyone else at the time,
he made his own mixtures. And so, he would have explained to my
father how pastis was made. Because between us, it must be said,
like all gay people, he didn’t like pure water.
No, no, no. Also, he was looking for a drink that was both
thirst-quenching and beneficial to health. Pastis contains
almost all the ingredients that absinthe had, with an
aniseed predominance, but with the presence of multiple plants
such as fennel and star anise in absinthe. On February 12, 1915,
absinthe was officially banned because it was considered
toxic and hallucinogenic. The French will long miss this
drink nicknamed the green fairy because of its color. Its aniseed flavor made it very popular,
which paved the way for aniseed-flavored drinks without absinthe, such as pastis. We will use a
Provençal word, pastis. So why does this Provençal word
come to our lips like this? Well, quite simply because pastis,
in Provençal, means mixture. So, we can clearly see this operation
which consists of mixing liquor with water. And it was on that day, you see,
that he made a big decision. He said to his father: Dad,
when I grow up, I will make pastis and it will be famous all over the world. And my father, who was curious about everything, started making these mixtures. And besides, my grandfather said to him:
You’re going to ruin me, because one day, he blew up some stills. You’re going to ruin me. On my father’s desk,
I had made a laboratory, a library, a painting studio. One day
I blew up, I had made a glass still
with alcohol in it which exploded. I was all burned.
There, they say to me: You will make me miss you. I say: It’s hunting.
I thought to myself: This is hunting. The soft bank that exploded. Who had a gas backflow. Actually, it wasn’t that. He wanted to repaint you. And my grandfather played the trumpet. And my grandfather was
in the town band. And my grandfather said: You know,
art does not feed its man. Not good.
You have to… Work, then after that,
you can do what you want. My father says: I’m going to work. He wanted to abandon his
studies after leaving the second year of high school. Yet he was a very good student. He said to his father: Listen,
I don’t want to work anymore. He was able to study.
My grandfather was not very happy. He said: You come with
me to the store, you come. But you won’t be paid. You will work with the accountant. I’m going to teach you
a little bit about oenology too. So, almost secretly, he went to
study Fine Arts in Marseille. And at the Beaux-Arts, I went there
from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. and from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. And then I was going to sell
my Caltagas brandy. And so, to avoid being a burden on my
father, who didn’t pay me anyway, I took the train,
I went to the far end of Marseille and I came back on foot,
visiting all the bars. I stopped at all the bistros
to sell my brandy. And where did you get the idea
to create your eau de vie? It was to sell something,
to make a living. And sometimes, even if I went to bed
, I couldn’t go to bed, I would still work until 3 a.m. And there, I would put illustrations
in front of me and I would draw, I would paint, I would practice. As a teenager,
Paul Ricard was eager to learn. He dropped out in the second year of high school,
seeing himself more as an autodidact. It must be said that he also has to find
time for his passions such as theater,
painting and even cinema, which he practices as an amateur with friends. However, his parents believe he
needs to think about his future. His great interest in chemistry will
soon make things more concrete. He loved chemistry. He loved chemistry during all these… When he had time,
he did experiments. He loved it, he loved it.
And then, pastis was in vogue. It was fashionable, it was… It was becoming commonplace,
everyone did. And then, with his parents
in the spiritual world. And then, he already had,
since he had started with the comtagas, so he wanted
to create something. He was always in
great admiration of those who… Creators, in every way. And that, I think, is schoolteacher. He also always speaks of his
schoolmasters who made him study the lives of great men. And I think he wanted to
do something good. In 1932,
the free education of anis was authorized. That is to say, we were no longer obliged to
put 150 grams of sugar per liter. You made a law,
like all laws that were ridiculous, It was to disgust
people from drinking it. It was too sweet. So there were the smugglers,
the pharmacists who sold extracts, the herbalists
who sold packets of herbs. When we put it in the alcohol that they
went to buy in a store and the bistros put it
in a small bottle, in the pocket. When there was no one around, they sold
the pool, as they say, clandestinely. So that’s where I learned,
I saw the tastes of the consumer, the taste, of things that pleased because
people would travel a kilometer to go to a
bistro where the food was good. As we said, a good
20 brand points. People were looking for good quality. Yours is very good. This is where, unfortunately,
I left all my drawings at the Beaux-Arts, which I
returned to at that time. And I didn’t go back anymore,
I didn’t have time to go back anymore and I started making pastis
with my friends from the neighborhood. When I first started making the pastry, it was so successful that we received phone calls all the time,
we couldn’t deliver. It started like this. My father, with his brother,
his younger brother Pierre, began to do their
market research in Sainte-Marc, and then later in Belle-de-Mais. And then the little friends came to help
And then, they arrived at one point, it was so successful
that they stopped coming. They said they were out
of stock, but they couldn’t bottle it in the evening,
put it in a bottle, do the bottling, all that. The other producers
of Le pastis laugh a little. Like my grandfather,
it’s the little one who has fun. The little one who is having fun, the little one
who is having fun, he has surpassed all of them. Paul Ricard’s success was dazzling. In 1932, he sold
364,000 bottles of pastis, and seven years later, in 1939,
on the eve of the war, he sold ten times more,
3.6 million bottles. It was my grandfather, Joseph Ricard,
who initially took care of the Ricard company. It was called Anis Ricard. And it was my grandfather
who took care of the accounting. My grandfather helped him a lot. In 1936, he married Marie-Thérèse Thiers. Until his marriage,
Paul Ricard was not paid, everything being managed by his father. He finally has an income commensurate
with his exemplary success. He can afford his dream house,
the Château de Sainte-Marthe. In 1937, he showed the first
clear sign of his success. The castle of Sainte-Mars was marvelous. It was an old
hunting ground for wealthy people. So there, I think there
were the means. He bought the castle,
he wanted to show his father, I imagine, that in the end, it wasn’t the little one
who was having fun who had arrived. And my grandfather said to him: That’s
very good, it works, but above all, do n’t bother going to Paris,
because you’ll ruin yourself. And there, he did not see the rise in Paris,
since my grandfather died in And so he created his company,
Ricard, immediately giving it an
imperialist slogan, in a way: Ricard, the real pastis of Marseille. That means there were others. There were competitors. Everyone could very
well make their own pastis. But here it is: Ricard,
the real pastis of Marseille. And it will be a triumph,
because Marseille, first in the 1930s,
is a port, a large city that can easily bring in a whole host
of products, including colonial ones, but also from the hinterland. So, I’m obviously thinking of the plants
used to make pastis. And then you have a network
of very large liquor stores in a city that is both industrial and
commercial, and all that, you have a large, consumer-oriented population. So, all of this will
obviously benefit Ricard. It takes five times the volume of pastis. And if your water is ice cold,
you get a thirst- quenching, refreshing,
invigorating and delicious tasting drink. And with that, much less
alcoholic than funeral wine. It’s true.
I don’t need you to tell me. Come on, to the good sale. The safety of his pastis
is that it combines several ingredients: licorice which comes from Abyssinia,
plants which come from Marseille and star anise
which comes from China, from Yunnan. So, it is these three ingredients
with five volumes of water and above all a lot of sun
which will form, I would say, the singularity of Ricard pastis. Second singularity, he will give his name
to his brand and that will be a real guarantee
to reassure consumers. So this is the origin. A thwarted vocation. He wanted to be an artist, winner of the
Grand Prix de Rome. He will be an artist,
but in another universe, with his brand and everything he will be able to
create around his product to bring it to life and make it essential. Third
essential ingredient: selling. The team that goes to cafes and
bars to sell Ricard. This is what will be Ricard’s strength. Ricard will always say
to his team: Make a friend every day. And so, he will test his product everywhere. He will have it consumed
in all places where one can consume Ricard or an aniseed drink. Paul Ricard’s success does
not protect him from tragedy. His father, Joseph, died at the age of 52 in 1937
and did not see the triumph of Ricard pastis in Paris. And in 1939, at the age of 25,
his younger brother Pierre also died. Paul Ricard has lost its two pillars,
the two people who have helped it most since the beginning. His brother was his accomplice. It was with him that he did
his first market research. It was his brother who helped him and
the little neighbors to fill the bottles at night.
He was his confidant, that was all. And there, he was a great
athlete, my uncle. And then one day he
fell off his bicycle, he felt unwell and then he had tuberculosis. So he went to the Alps
and my father set up a depot. He was busy and continued to be busy
until his death in 1939, taking care of his sector. But it’s true that it was terrible. And then, I find… I reviewed their correspondence when
it was the older brother, my father, so it was his younger brother. And I found pretty postcards
that he sent, written in Provençal, wrote to him in Provençal. And sent the love that was worn. Paul Ricard bought the Méjean estate
in Camargue in 1939, which covers 1,000 hectares. He has the means and wants to invest. He also plans to use it for some of
the herbs and plants he needs to make his pastis. The Camargue is an arid land,
scorched by salt, and this is the opportunity for Paul-Ricard to
take on a new challenge, that of setting out to conquer
these great wild spaces. My father bought Méjean just
before the declaration of war. He had bought Méjeanne first
because it was from a very young age. He was a lover of the Camargue.
He came with… My grandfather was a wine merchant. He came with his grandfather,
already my great-grandfather, to buy sand wine. And my great-grandfather would
put him on the roof of the truck and he was amazed. A little Paul, and we did a count,
a little Paul in Méjane, he was dazzled by the Camargue. He was coming from Marseille. He comes from the olive trees in Marseille,
but it was tense like in the Camargue, the white horses, the black towers. It was for a child,
it was wonderful. He had climbed the
Bissonnaire passes with his grandfather. I think that’s where
his artistic soul was revealed. And so, if he were asked why he
had bought Méjean, he would have said because it was for sale. Because in principle,
that’s always what he answered. But I think it wasn’t just
because it was for sale, because he loved the Camargue and because he
saw that there were things that were going to come.
Everyone felt it there. In Europe, things were not going well. When the Second World War broke out,
Paul Ricard was at the head of a business that already employed 600 people. All the
factory vehicles are requisitioned. Paul Ricard and the
male staff are mobilized. For his part, he joined
a regiment of Alpine hunters. His mother organized herself
and the female staff at the Sainte-Marthe factory to keep it running. Mobilized after the defeat of June
1940, Paul Ricard returned to his factory and his responsibilities. But a law enacted on August 24,
1940 by the Vichy government prohibited the consumption of aperitifs with an alcohol
content of more than 16% and established alcohol-free days. It’s the breakup. Marshal Pétain and the
Vichy government decided to abolish all alcoholic beverages
on the pretext that they would have caused… It was one of the causes
of the defeat of 1940. There were the teachers,
the paid holidays of 36, the aperitifs, etc.
So, deletion. So, the Second World War
will be marked as what I called a general detoxification cure
for the French population. Not that Marshal Pétain was
hostile to wine, but wine is not alcohol
as they said at the time, so wine is saved, even during the war. On the other hand, alcohol is
becoming a national danger, a national scourge that must be
eradicated by all means. It’s a disaster
for the Paul Ricard company. As you can imagine,
there is no compensation. So, he gathered all his staff together
and he said to them: Well, now, since I don’t like to lose,
since this, He says it in his book: Since we can no longer make pastis,
we are going to go to the Camargue and we are going to retrain as farmers
and we are going to make rice. The staff was stunned. Thanks to their will and their work,
this uncultivated land, abandoned by men, is reborn. Accountants and drivers,
representatives and secretaries become farmers, tenant farmers,
earthmovers, surveyors, builders. But that was it, going to Germany,
doing the compulsory work. So, they preferred to follow their boss,
as they called him, they left for the Camargue. But you have to imagine the arrival here,
when they bought cows, they arrived from the Alps. Besides, people here are laughing a little,
they’re going to say: Ricard, what is this apprentice farmer who’s arriving? They didn’t know that my
father was of peasant origin. They knew very well what he was doing.
It must have been… I imagine, these people who were managers
at the factory, who were in the bottling plant. It must have been terrible. It’s a great adventure all the same. But this stage of returning to the land,
in this particularly harsh climate, will never take place without difficulty. They built
houses to accommodate themselves. They sowed themselves so they could
feed themselves and their friends. And he was one of the first to revive
rice cultivation and, above all, to make it known. Because at that time, in 1940,
the French didn’t really like rice. It was mostly for cattle. And he applied the same practices to the promotion of rice as to the promotion of pastis. Come on. He is 32 years old. And then, when he arrived in Camargue,
there was the problem of the breeders. When the breeders saw
these new farmers who wanted to start growing rice, they were afraid. They said: That’s it, we’re not going to
have any more land for our herds. How are we going to do it?
Well, anyway. And my father produced a screenplay,
wrote a book called La Caraque Blonde and brought it to the screen. And it is the story, precisely,
of two families, a family of growers and a family of breeders. We have to die for Mr.
Bezal to grow his rice there. A wild food. Will you go somewhere else? The Camargue is big. The Camargue has no
room for herds. I’ll look for it. She only has
the damn rice left. Do you see that a plant growing in
broth swells with Christians? They are crazy. I cannot go into these details.
Much later. Go away.
This film was very successful. And besides, we have in the museum a letter
from a member of the Félibrige, who was apparently very
anti-regiculture, and who said to my father: Now, after having seen your beautiful
film, I see your love for this country. I see now, I regret
having judged you so badly and I see now that we will be able to get along. Paul Ricard has always been a convinced activist of the importance of spreading
the Provençal language and culture. It is part of the legacy of Frédéric
Mistral, Provençal poet and Nobel Prize winner, co-founder in 1854 on the 4th of Félibrige,
a movement which works for the safeguarding and promotion of everything which constitutes
the identity of the Languedoc region. There were many writer friends,
Provençal poets, Jordy Reboul, from Marseille. At that time, they had also created
the Marseillais d’Occitanie group. My father even did propaganda. He was posting posters for
municipal elections in Provençal. He was arrested in Saint-Maxima
because we didn’t have the right. He said: He is a Provençal above all,
he defended his language. He defended his language,
he said: Why am I not allowed to speak my language? Do you see the Camargue bulls? They have horns like that. The Spanish bulls of Coruida
have their horns like this, at the bottom. Camargue bulls. You see, during
peace in war. I set off on my horse at a gallop
and shouted: Long live the Camargue! Jean-mother of Marshal Pétain and his
government, long live the claquemard! Here, there is freedom. And no one heard me. He produced the quarter of milk required
to supply the children of Bouches-de-Rhône, all the same. And then, I think that behind all that
, as he was a visionary, he thought that afterwards,
Méjean could be a very beautiful place of openness, welcome, conviviality,
and which could, afterwards, help to raise awareness of the brand. If I make Méjean a beautiful
agricultural estate, it is still a beautiful brand image
for Ricard which will be reborn, because he was convinced of it. Before the war,
Paul Ricard not only bought the Méjean estate in the Camargue,
but he also purchased a mineral water spring in the heart of the Ardèche,
the Pestrin spring. Less exposed than Méjean,
Pestrin offers him the possibility of hiding in case he is worried
about his help to the resistance network and of hiding people who need it. The region being abundant in fruit,
he brought equipment from the Sainte-Marcte factory to distill nearly
1,700 tons of fruit to provide alcohol and fill
the tanks of the vehicles of the Ardèche maquis. And my father, moreover,
had asked for false papers. Exactly, because he could have been
arrested and sent to Germany. So, on these false papers,
he had written Pierre Roland. So, this allowed him to travel
between Ardèche and Marseille and help other people. He helped quite a few people. They always spoke about it with tears
in their eyes because there were some who were able to help him, others
who would have been denounced. And that is a
dark part of our history, of the French, of the collaborators. And during this time,
my grandmother and the women stayed, because here, it was
still very harsh, Camargue. So the women stayed
in Sainte-Marc, at the Marseille factory, with my grandmother. And they made fruit juices
and sent parcels to their prisoner friends who were in Germany. In 1949, Paul Ricard
finally resumed the production of pastis. But his disappointment was great when, at
the Liberation, the new government only partially revoked the provisions
of the Vichy regime and authorized aperitifs at a maximum of 40 degrees,
while Paul Ricard absolutely wanted to make his drink at 45 degrees,
considering that it would be incomparably better. It was not until 1951
that authorization was finally issued. When it was allowed,
Ricard was free in Méjean. So all tourists were
entitled to a free Ricard. And we children
served Ricard. So there were no
legal issues, etc. yet. And for years. So, it was this generosity, therefore,
which ultimately made, I think, the difference with other companies. Ricard’s secret: generosity,
conviviality, all of this, which was later taken up by the other competitors. But that’s what made
the company rich. Hello, hello, Ricard, please
serve us without delay. This aniseed seeks the most perfect. No danger to health,
it is the lightest, We always see ourselves well made,
a winter as a summer, in the land of the sun, under a blue sky, it seems to me. We take our pastis with delight. You will love its color, its flavor, oh what happiness. Rica, Rica, Rica. We were banned for ten years. Ten years later, they
sold us ten times more. After ten years of ban. In prohibition,
it is a service that has been rendered to us. Look at American Prohibition. If it weren’t for Prohibition,
America would be consuming a lot less alcohol today. Prohibition encourages consumption. It was the 1951 law that made it possible to make pastries at 45 degrees. There is a small constraint,
because there will be many constraints in Paul Ricard’s life
on the legislative level. A small constraint:
press campaigns and posters were banned for aniseed-flavored drinks, but not at all
for other drinks, whisky, etc. What will he do?
He’s going to do sponsorship. He reestablished what he had
started to do in 1939. He had asked the Marseille singer
Darcélice to sing in different places, in small towns. He organized singing competitions, etc. When the Tour de France returned,
he was the first to create a caravan. There are parties
at the end of each stage. And there, he brings in singers:
Darcellis, the Marseille singer, Charles Trenet, Annie Cordy. And there, he will develop another weapon of the Ricard brand: derivative products, caps, big Ricards. It was he who designed the beautiful Ricard,
which, moreover, allows the ice cube not to come out since it is pinched. The real postil of Marseille
is Ricard, it’s Ricard, it’s Ricard. On this, there must be
27 different Ricard objects. So, of course, I’m not going to
name them all, you see them. There’s the watch, the scarf, the pin,
the apron, because Ricard has Nizette. So. Ricard even pushed the screw
into socks in the name of Ricard. We have socks with the Ricard name on them,
so I think that’s original. And Ricard, at that moment,
really had a brilliant idea. He said to himself: Since we can’t write
advertising, we’ll advertise through other forms. Ricard’s governance
is indeed investing in everything that can be convivial,
sponsoring numerous sporting and cultural events. We talk at the Foundation about art. So, I think it has always been
something important and something that also leaves a lasting impression. That is to say that when you take
a little interest in Ricard, you also feel that there is this spirit, I would say, friendly,
family, that you don’t necessarily feel elsewhere. Waiter, waiter, a nice
cold pastis and naturally, a Ricard. We are pleased to have
Paul Ricard’s self-portrait. Paul Ricard not only created the
brand, but he was also imaginative. He was a jack of all trades. He made drawings,
he made sketches. By the way, I have some
sketch images. He was very close to his
staff, as I am fortunate to have the speech he actually gave at
the 1955 Christmas celebrations to his entire staff. I am counting on you,
because I have seen you in the past, you have references.
You are all men of example. Without it, you wouldn’t be here. It’s because you were successful
that you stayed in the company. Otherwise,
we can say that we would not want to keep them because we have never
kept mediocre people. You can’t build anything with incompetent people
. It is with men of value,
with men of talent. These men of talent and values
that you are. The isolated man is a lost man. Also, nothing should be neglected
in the recruitment, selection, initiation, information and
development of the company’s employees. Everything that can promote
enrichment, general culture, the elevation of the spirit and the improvement of
the professional qualities of each person must be undertaken. Paul Ricard is a very
endearing person when you read his story. Just like Pagnol,
in short, he’s a true Marseillais. This is the story of a
successful Marseillais. So, yes, we like it. That’s a good point. I’ve been collecting
Ricard objects since 1998. So, I started small,
I started putting down an ashtray, a few carafes, a few executioners. And the collection began to grow. Now I’m
at almost 4,000 items. With a bottle of Ricard,
it was 50 doses, 2 centiliters, a volume for 5, that was always
the selling point. While other brands of lozenges,
pastis, with a bottle, we made 15 lozenges. So, the cafes in the business,
when they arrived, we would say: With mine,
you will sell 50 glasses and with the other, you will sell 15. People, they joined
Ricard directly. So, it was already a marketing idea
that made people go and buy Ricard. We are in a region where everyone
talks about Ricard… It’s unifying, like pétanque,
Ricard, the sun, like OM. It is part of the heritage of
Marseille and the region. So it’s true that it helped a little
to make the collection, to say: It’s a local brand, it’s
associated with the south, with the south of France. So, ladies and gentlemen, it has an area of 95 hectares. And it was bought
by Mr. Paul Ricard in 1958. After having bought the small island
of Bindorre in 1950, Paul Ricard bought not the island of Zambiers. In particular, he made it a large
marina and a seaside resort while preserving the wild side of the island. Very sensitive to
environmental issues and in reaction to the dramatic pollution known as
the Red Ends discharged into the Mediterranean, he created an oceanographic institute there in 1966 with Alain Bombard
. It is also a research laboratory
where scientists work year-round to protect the sea. Ambiers Island was literally
shaped by Paul Ricard, who, in what he himself called his passion
for creation, designed all of its features. You know, when you act,
you act to get applause. But when we build,
when we build for posterity, we don’t care about anything that might
happen in our time. The great artists, the great masters. Do you understand? We still have the morality of Socrates,
the genius of Archimedes, of Galileo, of Leonardo da Vinci. That’s it. These are its foundations, because without them we
would not have an astronaut on the moon. In 48, he made
a trip to the United States. Moreover, who relates in a notebook
which is a marvel, because it was an epic at that
time, to go to the United States, it was necessary to go to Labrador,
it was necessary to make planes. And
then I think he was very, very surprised, influenced by all these
great entrepreneurs like Henry Ford, etc. He had to visit the Hollywood studios. And so when he came back,
he came with a slightly changed chip. He already saw that there were
communication problems with alcohol. It was complicated. So he said: How could I
communicate in an indirect way? As he was curious about everything, he
said: I’m going to get into cinema. And he knew Pagnol very well
, he was a very good friend of Pagnol. And Pagnol sold his
Marseille studios. So he bought all his equipment back. He said: I am going to create, I am going to
make a French Hollywood in Marseille. So, next to the castle of Santa María,
there were annexes. He built,
he made a studio in Sainte-Marc which was called Protis Film,
the film company. And then, cinema
allowed him to hold receptions for film launches
and to promote his pastis. From 1949 and for around ten
years, Paul Ricard produced films. In particular, he asked Jacqueline Audrey,
the only female director of the post-war period, now unjustly
forgotten, to bring to the screen La Caraque blonde with Tilde Atamard
and Horan Demasis, and for which Paul Ricard himself wrote the screenplay. We should also mention Porte d’Orient
by Jacques Darrois with Dalio or Honoré de Marseille by Maurice Regamey
with Fernand Delle. Fernand Delle, the man from the south,
the Provençal who cultivates his accent with delight among the Parisians,
will spend part of his career at the Ricard company. With this accent, this good manners, there too,
it goes down well and everyone wants to follow Fernand Delt. And so, Fernand Delle will be
the publicist, the best of the Ricard company, indisputably. On the island of Embiez, on this day,
like every first Sunday in August, the day for collectors of Ricard brand promotional items is held. Philippe is one of the organizers
behind this event. This is an opportunity to unearth rarities. Okay, that works, I’ll keep the stand. Ten euros. I think…
I think it’s really good. Perfect, that’s it. He stopped everything, and now he… Are you okay?
Yes. How would you sell it? It’s for the 100th anniversary of the birth of Paul-Ricard, 1909, 2009. These are anniversary bottles. How would you sell it? You didn’t choose, did you?
You didn’t choose, did you? The most common. So it has nothing to do with
the price of all the others. I’m selling this one for €150. 150€ anyway, yes. It’s interesting,
but well, it’s not… It’s empty anyway. If it were full, I think it
could sell for a lot more. I’ll think about that price. You think, you tell me. I’ll come back later to pick it up,
but it’s very pretty. No worries.
You won’t find that one anywhere else. THANKS. Yes, a Ricard, a quarter to. Yeah, how much are you selling it for?
In price? Yes.
Oh yes. There are some who went
for 1,800, 2,000 euros. Without the sales sites? I’m not interested because
I already have it, but it’s… Ricard, you have to know how to serve it. It’s quite simple: one part Ricard
and five parts cold water. Really, it’s good. Would you like to know
why I made pastis? It’s because I wanted to be an artist
and my father told me: Art doesn’t feed its man. And my father wanted me to earn my living
with him in his profession. He was a wine merchant. So one day I said to him:
But what if I made pastis? He started laughing. And then I told him:
With the 6, I will find the means of existence,
I will earn an income and then I will be able to paint.
So, it happened now. He didn’t notify anyone, he didn’t even
send a notice letter or anything. He gathered his staff at Sainte-Marc.
He said: I’m leaving. It was amazing. Even his secretary,
I don’t think she came back. He was tired. I think he was tired
because his whole life was a fight against the administration. And there, I think there were new
laws that had to be passed. And he said: No, enough, Ya,
I can’t take it anymore, I’m leaving. 8, I think he wanted to do
other things that he didn’t have time to do. You have to take care of your islands
and create and build, because Ricard, everything was done, in the end. He knew that his
sons were there and that they were going to leave him. He left in 68.
He left. I always say, it’s his
way of taking to the barricades. In 68 he went to take care of his
Paul Ricard company, which contained the Bindor Islands and the
Zambier Island and the other thing. So there he started
building again, building again. That’s what he wanted.
My father was a builder above all. END ?
No, of course, it continues. The succession is assured thanks to Paul Ricard’s son. First Bernard, then Patrick,
who took over in 1971. Patrick ensured the merger of Ricard
with Pernau in 1975, and thus became CEO of the
Pernau-Ricard group, until his untimely death in 2012. Alexandre Ricard, Bernard’s son,
took over and is still CEO of the group today. It would have been impossible to imagine
that the drink, patiently created by Paul Ricard
in his parents’ house in Sainte-Marthe, under the indulgent gaze
of his father, would ultimately lead to the creation of the
largest alcohol group in the world, the Pernod Ricard group,
which occupies first or second place in the world depending on the year. Paul Ricard still had almost 30 years
to live, which he would spend devoting himself to his family, developing his islands,
his Castelet airfield, and creating the
adjoining motor racing circuit that bears his name. And also, finally, to painting. Painting, always. Painting is
the river of his life. When painting was no longer
possible, the river dried up and he bowed out beautifully at night. He was pampered until the last moment. His staff worked
until the last minute to ensure their boss was in the most
beautiful place in the world. He chose it because he
wanted to be facing the sea. And in the best conditions. And then after, when my brother Patrick
died, he said to me: What do we do? Why not put him with his father? And so, he went to join him. And that’s what we do for us,
the wealth is even more of this island, they are both there. This man who created his kingdom
and then his son who created this empire thanks to this father who taught him everything. They came together.
It’s very beautiful. Just as my father could not foresee
the future, I cannot foresee the world you will live in,
but I wish it to be a better world, a world I have always
wished for and always strived to work for. So, we’ll talk about the rest later. There is much,
much to say. Thanks grandpa.