“Very worrying situation“. This is how Tod’s owner Diego Della Valle (in photo from Imagoeconomica) defines the current economic scenario caused by the duties wanted by US President Donald Trump. The Marche-based entrepreneur spoke on the sidelines of the presentation of the book Italian Hands, Artisanal Stories from Italy that took place at Salone del Mobile.
Very worrying situation
Diego Della Valle is especially concerned about the direct impact of tariffs, which generate uncertainty and curb consumption. “Because all this then penalizes small businesses. Artisans can have huge problems. And when an artisanal company has huge problems and closes down, we have lost it forever”, Della Valle tells the newspaper Il Giorno. The industrialist hopes for a solution “and quickly, because the risk is that a large part of the global economy will come to a standstill”.
American strategies
In 2023, the last Tod’s group financial statements published before delisting, sales in the Americas made up just 7.5% of total revenue. This is also why, as Reuters wrote the following year, “Tod’s will invest in marketing to capitalize on its prestige in understated elegance and increase sales in the United States”. Incidentally, in an interview with us in February last year, Andrea Della Valle told us that by 2025 the process of “strengthening the U.S. market” would begin for Hogan. Who knows if with this new scenario generated by duties, Tod’s group’s investments to develop the star-studded market will continue or slow down.
Spurring young people
Speaking of artisans, the protagonists of the volume Italian Hands, Artisanal Stories from Italy, Diego Della Valle said the book was also born “with the idea of telling the quality of things to spur young people on, to make them understand that thinking about becoming artisans is not reductive at all”.
