“The market will resume with new rules, dictated by the consumer-actor, who is increasingly the protagonist, and capable of preferring one good to another because it is produced in a circumscribed territory where ethics, sustainability and other values are at home. Some sort of PGI bag”. Luca Bortolami (in the photo), CEO of Tigamaro, a leather goods manufacturer from Tolentino (Macerata) that produces for luxury brands, came to visit us at La Conceria booth at Lineapelle 103 (20/22 February). We took the opportunity to talk to him about the sector’s dark moment, which he defines as “a structural crisis of the system” and which, precisely for this reason, represents an opportunity to change the rules. Bortolami advocates the emergence of collaborative platforms even at the vertical level to change the narrative of a fragmented supply chain.
It is a structural crisis
From the pandemic to today, several crises have followed one another rapidly. “It is not just one black swan: there is a herd of black swans here that we have to deal with”, Bortolami jokes. “There is a structural crisis triggered by a sudden change in the consumer, who prefers to spend on an experience rather than owning a good. But ours remains a physical market. In this context I ask myself: has the price rise been a boomerang? Was there an overconfidence of the brands?”.
New rules
For Tigamaro’s CEO, the crisis must become an opportunity to change the system, and to produce better. In other words: less quantity, but with greater remuneration for the supply chain. “Us producers must take a step back, less volume and more service. Now we sell time: instead we have to sell our ability to make the product, our savoir-faire. We also need to look at other markets, not just luxury”.
Vertical collaborative platforms
On this aspect, Bortolami believes that the orders from luxury brands to the various subcontractors are a limitation for the development of the companies themselves, which have little incentive to diversify. “Today, I see no new products and, in general, little research is done. The supply chain needs to go back to investing in creativity and product”, says Tigamaro’s CEO, who believes that the current drop in orders is still manageable, and that a revival of the sector can come no earlier than 2025. But in the meantime? “We need to reinvent ourselves. Become active companies, and not passive ones waiting for orders from above. It could be useful to form collaborative platforms that could emerge in the supply chain, even at a vertical level”, he concludes.
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