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Tod’s — luxury plus pop touch
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Diego Della Valle’s lifelong pursuit of Italian excellence and innovative marketing has turned his family shoemaking business into a global luxury conglomerate and made him one of his country’s most powerful industrialists.
The grandson of a cobbler, Della Valle is the classic story of an Italian family firm founded on craftsmanship in the 1920s and reaching the heights of fashion due to his drive and flair.
In the Shanghai office of Tod’s (he’s president and CEO), Della Valle wore a formal dark blue suit and his characteristic colored Tod’s bracelets. He had been flooded with ideas — he’s always thinking — and was collecting them all on small pieces of paper.
Tod’s SpA is a world leader in the luxury accessories sector and includes the brands Tod’s, Hogan, Fay and Roger Vivier.
No matter how many new ideas and direction he comes up with, Della Valle’s philosophy is constant: “Never forget our roots — excellent quality, understated luxury, exclusive products with a very modern touch.”
“When we speak about fashion, it’s all about creativity and when we talk about luxury it’s more about quality. At the same time, the two points of view arrive in the same line when you speak about the look of the product,” the 60-year-old tycoon told Shanghai Daily in an interview. “We want to do the best products with high quality and a strong modern touch, for the women, with a feminine touch as well.”
Delle Valle named Alessandra Facchinetti as the new creative director of Tod’s women’s collections. Her first collection was presented during the Milan Fashion Week.
“Her mission is to follow our traditions and roots with a very strong feminine and fashionable touch. She is a charming Italian woman with a good lifestyle. She is a designer and at the same time an ambassador for the women’s collection to translate our style,” he said.
Much of the collection is “iconic items” and the rest is 100-percent quality product “with the feeling of the moment,” he said.
New to Tod’s this season is the Sella Bag, fashioned from a strip of fine leather, gently curved like a saddle and inspired by a dressage saddle.
For this bag, the Italian luxury house has teamed with contemporary artist and photographer David LaChapelle to create a “dreamlike voyage of discovery” and bring a pop sensibility to the traditional world of saddlery. LaChapelle’s colorful photo images look like surrealist paintings and revolutionize the traditional style Tod’s is famous for.
“Values of quality and craftsmanship have always been part of Tod’s DNA, but we wanted to express them in a completely new and unusual way,” Della Valle said. So they called on LaChapelle “to interpret the idea of saddlery with a ‘pop touch’.”
The Pop Touch project demonstrates the brand’s contemporary thinking. “Everybody is speaking about quality and craftsmanship and it gets a bit boring sometimes,” the CEO said. “We chose one of the best modern artists and he liked the idea of giving a new message with a new style. He is a real genius: contemporary, not boring and also mindful of our roots.”
The men’s collection “Sartorial Touch” revives the genuine and proper nature of yesteryear, while maintaining just enough modernity.
The made-to-order projects feature the highest quality leather and are branded “J.P.Tod’s,” the trademark name dating back to the origin in the brand in the 1920s.
The key to Tod’s strength lies in manufacturing 100 percent of its products in Italy and relying on generations of skilled artisans, Delle Valle said.
“That’s how we define the quality and it’s never easy to copy. Our craftsmen are the best competitive points and it’s not possible to move our productions to the East. People love to do what they do and customers love to buy what they have. Why change?”
Delle Valle’s father Dorino taught him respect for quality and Delle Valle added “exclusivity” that he continues offering to his customers.
While other brands continue to open stores around China, Delle Valle has a different point of view. “We develop very well in this market and it’s wrong to operate in China with many stores. If you have too many stores, you don’t have any exclusivity anymore. You cut the dream.
“The strategy is to stay where we are, with what we have now and to do what we do now — and not move from our philosophy of exclusivity and high quality. We are real specialists in leather and we offer what people want: special quality things.”
Tod’s Chinese customers are part of the international community, like Italians and Americans, he said.
“A decade ago, nobody thought China would be that big now, which is a big surprise for everybody. Day by day, people understand more and people have a very good eye to choose the best,” he said.
Tod’s strategy is global. “We don’t create a special strategy in China,” Della Valle said.
Speaking about the slump in the Italian economy, Delle Valle said it’s time for successful Italians to give back and he has urged fellow business people to make a contribution.
In 2002, He rescued the Fiorentina soccer team from bankruptcy; he invested in Cinecitta, the Roman film studio; he helped fund the restoration of Colosseum; he’s member of the La Scala Foundation that supports Milan’s opera house. He raises funds for the Umberto Veronesi Cancer Research Foundation. He is president of the Delle Valle Foundation charity that funds education for needy children.
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