Biella in Tokyo for made in Italy

Over 200 of the most qualified retailers and operators in the Tokyo textile and clothing system on thursday 11 november attended the convention organised by the “Biella The Art of Excellence." Foundation on the topic "The widespread creativity of Biella at the roots of the success of made in Italy”. A wealth of ideas and interesting contacts developed during this one-day encounter.

Marco Della Croce, vice president of “Biella The Art of Excellence.”, opened the work sessions with presentation of the Foundation's mission, stressing the priorities that the district has to achieve in order to maintain its competitiveness.

“Origin, quality, creativity, ethics and education are the values that inspire our Foundation”, explained Della Croce, “and which allow our Biella-based businesses to guarantee the client and end user transparency regarding product excellence. These same values allow companies to meet new partners on an international level and in Japan," continues Della Croce, "which has always been a very discerning test market for us where this factor of transparency is concerned, the meta brand “Biella The Art of Excellence.” is guarantor of these very values”.

The economist Enrico Cietta, Diomedea partner, spoke of the importance of the Biella brand in conveying elements of choice to the consumer, who increasingly becomes a strategic link in the value chain.

“Innovation, both creative and technological, of districts like the textile one in Biella”, explained Cietta, “is hardly ever the fruit of an isolated business idea, representing as it does the result of a complex process of interaction between companies and between enterprise and the market." The creativity widespread throughout the whole supply chain and not only in the creative designer stage is the real competitive advantage of the Italian manufacturing district”.

The roundtable held during this meeting also saw participation by Franco Ferraris, CEO of the Lanificio Ermenegildo Zegna e Figli SpA, and Marco Bardelle, sales director of Tintoria Finissaggio 2000.

After presentation of the activity carried out by each of these companies, Franco Ferraris and Marco Bardelle, together with Marco Della Croce and Enrico Cietta, answered questions from the moderator, the Japanese journalist Atsuko Fujoka, and the audience.

On the subject of how companies will react to the world crisis, Franco Ferraris emphasised in particular that it is “important that what we sell has real value and what is produced matches its inherent value, in the light of changed consumer awareness in purchasing methods".

According to Marco Bardelle, who works upstream in the supply chain in a role that, thanks to finishing, research and technological innovation, is more and more strategic for the value of the end product, the recipe consists "in working alongside your client, listening to and observing shifts on the markets and rapid changes in demand, adding “creativity” to the “creativity of creative designers” while moving in the right directions for innovation and service”.

Work was drawn to a close by the president of the Biella Industrial Union and vice president of the Piedmont Confindustria for internationalisation, Luciano Donatelli, who highlighted four key points in the competitive capacity of the “Biella The Art of Excellence.” brand.

“Made-in-Italy is an asset and as such must be protected”, explained Luciano Donatelli. ”The battle is being fought in Europe but it safeguards all our clients and in particular our end client - the consumer.

It is a question first and foremost of ethics: origin labelling also means protecting our health, an aspect that sees Biella fighting in the front line with the Tessile e Salute (Textile and Health) Association and above all it is an issue that cannot but affect the future of textiles".

Luciano Donatelli concluded by also mentioning the importance of new technological frontiers in textiles and of new applications like Naval tex.

This evening, meanwhile, the third “Biella The Art of Excellence. Award” will be presented to this year’s winner, ISETAN Company Limited.