Welcome to Worms Services Maritimes, one of the oldest and most dynamic independent French shipping agencies.

Hypolite Worms (1801-1877), as founder of Maison Worms that bears his name, embarks in the international trade of English coal. In order to charter the ships to carry the ore out of the U K and prevent them from returning empty, the French and British branches were called upon to offer their services as shipping agents.

Hypolite Worms decides to form his own fleet not to be dependent on shipowners any more. The first unit named "Séphora", from the name of his wife, is acquired in 1856. With the "Sauternes" being phased in 1900, naming the ships from renowned Bordeaux wines becomes customary; the ships dedicated to the transport of heavy lifts are named after the cities of Normandy. The last Worms coaster is sold in 1968.

With the opening of the Bordeaux-Le Havre-Hamburg (1859) and Bordeaux-Antwerp (1869) lines, Maison Worms is focusing its cabotage network on routes between France and Northern Europe.
By supplying coal to shipping companies’ coal stations all over the world, the major European shipowners became part of Worms Services Maritimes portfolio.

Active in Egypt since 1851, Maison Worms supplies coal for the steam excavators used by the company in charge of digging the Suez Canal. In July 1869, four months before the inauguration of this new "waterway", the Port Said and Suez branches are opened to supply coal bunkers to the ships and provide the shipowners with the full range of maritime services.

Through the Schiaffino shipping company, Worms & Cie opens a branch in Algiers, where it supplies the French Navy ships with bunkers. Close links will be maintained with this company until it disappears in the 1990s. Maison Worms built several of her ships in the shipyard of its own and managed in Normandy, near Rouen, between 1917 and 1966 (Workshops and Shipyards of Seine-Maritime - ACSM)

Between 1929 and 1934, Worms & Cie boosts back the Compagnie Havraise Peninsulaire which will become Nochap or NCHP as one of its subsidiaries whose management will be in the hands of the Worms Services Maritimes until it is sold in 1986. During the inter-war period, Maison Worms gave birth to the French Company of Petroleum Transport - SFTP which will be sold to Compagnie Maritime Belge together with the entire shipowning Group in 1997.

After the Second World War, Worms & Co. is back to sea transport by opening liner services to Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia. An agency is opened in Casablanca in 1946 and new vessels are phased in for this trade while ports in North Europe are served by chartered vessels.
Decolonization movements combined with rail and road competition led to the dismantling of the cabotage network in the late 1960s.

Following the nationalization of the Suez Canal (1956), the independence of Tunisia (1957) followed by Algeria (1962), Worms & Cie is gradually developing a partnership with Egyptian, Tunisian and Algerian similar companies.
The state monopoly implemented by the Algerian Government on maritime transport by the 1976 constitution however prompted Maison Worms to withdraw until 1998 when the government decided to open again the sector to private companies.

The General Management of the maritime services takes the form of an independent company under the name of Worms Services Maritimes.
Thanks to its organization, its network established in most of the French and the East Mediterranean ports, its commercial potential and its highly qualified staff, Worms Services Maritimes can assist the shipowners and deal with all the importers’ and exporters’ requirements in terms of transport.