A system for handling iron and steel products, such as, in particular, slabs, blooms, billets and similar products, which have intersecting translation movements. These include apparatus for gripping, handling and transporting iron and steel products and adapted for being driven in a translation movement along a running path, and a transfer carriage on which the apparatus for gripping and carrying a product is positioned. The transfer carriage is capable of being displaced along a running path, according to a translation movement perpendicular to the translation movement of the gripping apparatus in order to bring the product to any desired location.