The leather supply chain, which in the last 20 years has become one of the engines of the Tuscan industry, continues to attract investments from luxury brands. The thrust comes, at this stage, above all from the French giant LVMH which, through the Metiérs d’Art division (which brings together the shareholdings in suppliers), is defining – according to Sole 24 Ore – the acquisition of the majority of the historic tannery Nuti Ivo, one of the most important names in the district of Santa Croce sull’Arno (Pisa), specialized in luxury leather goods (in 2021 it had a turnover of € 58.7 million with a net profit of 8.65 million) and part of a group family made up of seven tanneries with more than 130 million in revenues.
Objective: to save the know-how
The operation will soon be communicated to the market: “For now I can’t say anything – explained Matteo De Rosa, CEO of LVMH Metiérs d’Art, a division with 600 million euros in revenues, in Florence for the General States of Italian leather goods – but soon there will be news. We want to safeguard the excellence of the districts, not only in Tuscany but also in the South, in Puglia and Sicily. Our strategy today is to acquire not only minority shares, but also majority shares in those realities that do not have a generational transition and that would risk seeing their know-how compromised, to make it available to everyone, not just our brands “. LVMH already owns, since 2019, 20% of the Masoni tannery in Santa Croce, which last August acquired a minority stake in another tannery in the Tuscan district, Ulivieri & Nardi.
The other operations of the group in Italy
The acquisition of the Nuti Ivo tannery follows three other operations that LVMH has carried out, or is defining, in these weeks in Tuscany relating to brands in its portfolio: Fendi has recently inaugurated a 30 thousand square meter bag factory and 50 million investment in the the Florentine municipality of Bagno a Ripoli; In a few months, Givenchy will open a bag factory in the spaces vacated by Fendi in Ponte a Ema, also in the municipality of Bagno a Ripoli; Louis Vuitton, the group’s flagship brand, is planning the construction of a large bag factory in Pontassieve (Florence).
The Assopellettieri alarm: there is no staff
“Luxury brands make most of their profits thanks to leather goods produced in Italy”, underlined Franco Gabbrielli, president of Assopellettieri, opening the General States of leather goods in the Salone de ‘Cinquecento in Palazzo Vecchio and asking the future government for a policy industry for the sector. In fact, if the companies that work subcontractors for the big brands are becoming larger and more structured to face the market, the companies that produce their own brands, and which often have small and micro dimensions, are suffering and are asking for incentives to renew and digitize themselves. But the big knot that unites everyone, large and small, brands and independent companies, is the lack of personnel: the great challenge that made in Italy leather goods will have to face in the coming years.