From the Telegraph: The monasteries mean business.
The Abbey of Our Lady of Bellefontaine, hidden among orchards and farmland 30 miles south of the medieval city of Angers, has little in common with other corporate headquarters in Europe.
The Cistercian monastery's staff canteen is a soaring refectory where meals are taken in silence. There are no gyms or vending machines or conference rooms - unless you count the chapel. And the chief executive is not some fist-pumping sales whizz but Brother Gérard, a 54-year-old monk in a cream cassock, black hood and sandals.
For the past six years, Brother Gérard has been president of Monastic, an association set up in 1991 to protect and develop the cottage industries run in monasteries throughout France, Belgium and parts of Germany.
Annual turnover has now reached more than £3 million, with the shop at Our Lady of Bellefontaine accounting for one tenth of that. Monastic now has 227 monasteries and convents as members and is spreading into Africa and the rest of Europe. [continue]
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