Bruno de l’Espinay, playmaker in the interim and basketball, Success Story

Under the basketball hoops, the elbows are never far from the jaws, it always rubs a little. The pivot, generally immense, prevents the wingers from reaching the backboard, and it is often the leader who must imagine the solutions to find the way to the circle.

Bruno de l’Espinay has internalized this immutable rule of this team sport to the extreme since his studies at Le Mans and Tours, when he played for hours. The one who founded the network of temporary employment agencies Artus put on the sleeveless jersey, flocked with number 2, until the age of 46. His position ? Leader of course!

Today, Bruno de l’Espinay chairs the Tours Métropole Basket (TMB). Originally, the entrepreneur had taken over the Touraine Basket Club at the regional level, then merged it with a neighboring club, the PLLL Tours Basket. In 7 years, the new club has crossed 4 divisions. Promoted to Pro B this season, Tours are still undefeated at home.

Exemplary, involvement, conviviality

The passion for basketball transpires at Bruno de l’Espinay. This bon vivant, a bit authoritarian, is as charismatic as possible. “When he speaks, everyone is silent. It exudes a natural authority ”, assures an employee. And in the interim, a sector dominated by a juggernaut, Manpower, and a slew of challengers, we also had to work together.

Living on a game night near the president of the TMB is sport. In the small room with 1,500 seats north of Tours, the boxes are very close to the parquet floor. It vibrates, it shivers, it screams sometimes, but this die-hard smoker now saves his voice. The public, electrified, takes care of the noise.

Former playmaker of the Tours Basket Club team 2 in the 80s, when team 1 was crowned with the title of champion of France, the president of Artus never really let go, as his young players would say. During the matches, which he never misses at home, and which he tries to follow on the move, he exults, his feet mimic the changes of support. He grips the chair. In short, there is adrenaline.

The entrepreneur tries to share the values ​​of sport at work: exemplarity and involvement are part of the house’s play patterns. Like post-game friendliness too. Other entrepreneurs in the region support it. 250 partners have plunged into the TMB adventure, including Bpifrance for three years, which “wants to help it grow,” summarizes Patrice Bégay, director of the Bpifrance Team Excellence. He is involved in his business, as he is in his sport. It has a GPS point fixed far ahead. Bruno de l’Espinay has just joined the Bpifrance community of 55 leaders, these business leaders invested in collective sport.

Parquet of 3,500 places

Now 67 years old, this enthusiast has managed to delegate “the operational. But he remains the chief lobbyist, ”summarizes an executive from a corporate sponsor. On the balloon side, Bruno de l’Espinay entrusted the reins to a general manager, Romain Régnard, whom he took care to associate with the capital of TMB.

To pilot Artus Interim, he has relied on his son Alexis for ten years. The company has about sixty agencies, 250 permanent employees and 10,000 temporary workers for a turnover of around 150 million euros at the end of the year.

The former basketball player therefore retains free rein to develop his project: to have a real basketball hall in Tours, “with at least 3,500 seats”. While the city is reluctant, due to a high debt ratio, GL Events offers a lower cost solution, namely a structure set up in six months for 20 million euros. The Regional Council, the department of Indre-et-Loire and Tours Métropole are ready to follow. “As long as we don’t have it, we won’t be able to go up to Pro A,” laments Bruno de l’Espinay, who dreams of taking this final step and thus join the elite.