Ten small and medium-sized Connecticut aerospace companies are heading for Europe this weekend, as the Paris Airshow gets underway.
The annual European airshow is held alternate years in England and in France. This year it’s the turn of Paris - although those in the industry describe it as Mecca. “If you’re an aerospace engineer, there’s no better place to be than over either in Paris or Farnborough,” said Colin Cooper of Whitcraft, a precision parts maker in Eastford.
He said he will take 17 meetings in the three days he’s in France. “All the major players are in one place at one time, so we find it’s a very efficient mechanism for meeting with our customers and in some instances meeting with our suppliers.”
Relationship building of this kind, with the opportunity for face-to-face meetings, brings tangible results for the Connecticut companies that attend. Aero Gear, which is based in Windsor used to do all of its business in the United States. Now, after nine years of attending the annual show, a third of its sales are in Europe. And President Doug Rose said that would never have been possible without the state’s help. “We’re a 140 employee company - we never could have set up our own booth at the airshow,” Rose told WNPR.
Connecticut’s small and mid-size attendees have been helped by the state’s Department of Economic and Community Development, which shares the cost of promoting both the state and its companies at the show. Said Rose, "it serves a purpose for the state to back this and it also has a great purpose for smaller and mid size companies like us to expand."
The Paris Airshow opens June 15th and runs through the 21st.
