Forged from a tradition of excellence in engineering
On July 25, 1944, just a month shy of his eighteenth birthday, young J.M. Lapeyre filed his first patent for a shrimp peeling machine that would revolutionize how his father, the founder of Grand Caillou Packing Company, did business.
The observant J.M. noted the difficulty a workman had navigating the stairs of an offshore oil rig while carrying equipment. Always intrigued by a challenge, J.M. went home, dusted his feet with talcum powder, and proceeded to trace his natural gait while descending the stairs of his own home.
That simple experiment revealed the inherent inefficiencies of the traditional staircase. For every step, only half of each tread was used with the pattern alternating from left to right. J.M. realized that he could build a safer, more compact stair design by removing the unused half of each tread, providing a straight, direct line from one tread to the next.
The change in design resulted in the space-saving Lapeyre Stair alternating tread stair, a space-saving device that provides more usable tread depth than vertical ladders. The innovative design allows for comfortable and secure forward-facing descents at steep angles while minimizing the overall footprint over a traditional staircase.
Our alternating tread stairs are now used in virtually every industry, allowing workers to easily and safely access crossovers, catwalks, and other tight spots that do not permit the use of standard stairs.
A Stair is Born
By 1978, J.M. had been named the president of Laitram, and it was during this time that he applied his pioneering mindset to a problem that had been plaguing ships, oil rigs, and factories for decades.
The observant J.M. noted the difficulty a workman had navigating the stairs of an offshore oil rig while carrying equipment. Always intrigued by a challenge, J.M. went home, dusted his feet with talcum powder, and proceeded to trace his natural gait while descending the stairs of his own home.
That simple experiment revealed the inherent inefficiencies of the traditional staircase. For every step, only half of each tread was used with the pattern alternating from left to right. J.M. realized that he could build a safer, more compact stair design by removing the unused half of each tread, providing a straight, direct line from one tread to the next.
The change in design resulted in the space-saving Lapeyre Stair alternating tread stair, a space-saving device that provides more usable tread depth than vertical ladders. The innovative design allows for comfortable and secure forward-facing descents at steep angles while minimizing the overall footprint over a traditional staircase.
Our alternating tread stairs are now used in virtually every industry, allowing workers to easily and safely access crossovers, catwalks, and other tight spots that do not permit the use of standard stairs.
Continuously elevating standards
Lapeyre Stair operates a state-of-the-art production facility fully dedicated to stair manufacturing. Our current product line includes industrial access stairs, commercial egress stairs, and, of course, alternating tread stairs.
We also manufacture platforms, legs, and supports designed to easily integrate with our stair products into complete, custom systems. Every order we receive is custom built to meet the project specifications and to comply with the applicable code requirements. Our current manufacturing equipment line-up includes:
- Two high-definition plasma cutting tables for plate processing
- Three press brakes for tread processing
- CNC tube bender for handrails
We are committed to maintaining a state-of-the-art facility to ensure the quality of our products. All of our welders are certified to AWS D1.1 standard; we employ a full-time, certified, weld inspector to conduct 100% weld inspections; and have a 24-hour resolution policy for addressing issues.
