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BUSINESS

The Versace story: After its founder’s murder, how the luxury brand rediscovered its soul

Twenty years ago, stylist Gianni Versace was gunned down in Miami, plunging his fashion house into crisis. Two decades on, it is one of the world's top global luxury brands thanks to his little sister, Donatella

The Versace story: After its founder's murder, how the luxury brand rediscovered its soul
Donatella Versace. Photo: Patrick Kovarik/AFP

He had gone out for the morning papers: as Versace returned to his Miami beach mansion on July 15th, 1997, he was shot dead by Andrew Cunanan, a homosexual prostitute known for his obsession with all things luxury.

The fashion world mourned deeply. The stylist to celebrities from Madonna to Elton John had been just 50 years old.

“He was a 360-degrees creator, a real artist, he had a pure creative vision on colours and materials,” Stefania Saviolo, director of the luxury and fashion centre at Bocconi University, told AFP In Milan.

The group he had created with his brother Santo in 1978 had been one of the hottest fashion brands in the world.

It fell to Versace's platinum blonde sister Donatella – to whom Gianni had entrusted the casual line Versus – to take over as artistic director.

But the brand struggled to recover from Versace's murder. Donatella, who had worked for 14 years alongside Gianni, was severely affected by the loss of her brother and confessed to feeling “vulnerable”.

Depression and cocaine

“You can't invent yourself as an artistic director overnight,” says Saviolo, particularly as Donatella took over “at a time when fashion was changing a lot, with many collections and great pressure on artistic directors”.

Donatella, instantly recognizable for her famous locks and perpetual tan, sank into a period of depression and cocaine use before detoxifying in 2005. The year before, the brand had acquired a new CEO in Giancarlo Di Risio.

The former Fendi boss refocused the Medusa on the luxury market, streamlining licensing and franchising deals and developing the accessories range.

Amid rumours in the press of a fall-out between the family and Di Risio over planned cuts, he was replaced in 2009 by Gian Giacomo Ferraris, who moved over from the Jil Sander fashion house.

Ferraris wasted no time in launching an extensive reorganisation plan to return Versace to profitability, cutting 25 percent of its workforce and closing some boutiques before opening new ones as the books improved.

His intervention “doubled the turnover, which rose from 268 million euros in 2009 to 645 million in 2015,” according to David Pambianco, who heads up a consultancy company in his name.

By 2011 the historic brand had returned to profit after a gruelling three years of losses.

'So much potential'

“The right balance was struck between Ferraris and Donatella, the dialogue between them was good and there was great respect for Donatella's creativity and vision,” Saviolo said.

The family, which had always refused to relinquish control to a luxury conglomerate like so many of its fellow Italian fashion houses, finally yielded a 20 percent stake in 2014 to the US private equity firm Blackstone.

The move, which Donatella said would allow Versace to “achieve its potential”, resulted in a cash injection into the luxury designer and boosted its presence in emerging markets.

The bet paid off: despite a difficult global context, sales increased by some 17 percent in 2014 and in 2015.

The house said it was time to “move onto the next phase” and Ferraris was replaced in May 2016 by Jonathan Akeroyd, former CEO of Alexander McQueen.

Results last year were mixed, with sales up 3.7 percent to 668 million euros but the company admitting a loss of 7.4 million euros due in particular to funds sunk into its network of boutiques.

These results “have caused some uncertainty”, but “the company is healthy, certainly more than ten years ago,” said Pambianco.

“Versace remains one of the most beautiful brands in the world in the luxury sector” and has “still so much potential to express”, he said, pointing out that luxury house Gucci for example “has a turnover that is seven times higher”.

Saviolo agrees: “Versace has recovered its lost “red carpet DNA” and its style is currently “very daring, very strong.”

By Celine Cornu

READ ALSO: An end to fashion elitism? Not in Milan…

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CULTURE

Ice to AC: Nine of the most common American misconceptions about Italy

Have your friends in the US mentioned any of these common beliefs about Italy? Some come close to the truth, but others are totally misplaced.

Ice to AC: Nine of the most common American misconceptions about Italy

It’s no secret that Americans love to visit Italy; the Washington Post predicted in December that the country would be Americans’ top foreign tourist destination for 2023, and the volume of US visitors who’ve arrived in Italy since then appears to have borne this out.

But while many Americans have a deep knowledge of – and love for – Italian culture, there are some surprisingly enduring myths about Italy that can be found in the USA specifically.

Some come close to the truth, while others fall wide of the mark.

There is no ice in Europe/Italian restaurants charge for ice

Fiction – Americans love ice, beverages are routinely served with it and refrigerators in the US often have some type of ice dispenser attached to the door.

But in Italy, ice is simply less prioritised. While ice in your drink will usually not cost you extra, you might need to specifically request it. Soft drinks in Italy are usually served without ice, so if you want your beverage iced, you need to request the drink con ghiaccio – with ice.

READ ALSO: Aperol and aperitivo: A guide to visiting bars and cafes in Italy

A classic Italian spritz should always come with ice.
A classic Italian spritz should always come with ice. Photo by Tomasz Rynkiewicz on Unsplash

Italian homes don’t have dryers

Fact (mostly) – Tumble dryers do exist in Italy, but they’re rare. A survey published by Italy’s national statistics office (Istat) in 2014 found that just 3.3 percent of Italian households had one, whereas 96.2 percent had a washing machine and 39.3 percent a dishwasher.

Those washing lines strung with laundry hanging above the heads of passers by aren’t there just to create a quaint backdrop for photos – people make wide use of the abundant sun to air dry their clothes and sheets.

That does not mean that Italians in cities don’t occasionally use clothes dryers though if they’re in a rush; some might take items to a nearby laundromat.

McDonald’s is healthier in Italy

Fact (sort of) – McDonald’s uses different ingredients based on the country, and the Big Mac in Italy is (slightly) healthier than the one sold in the United States. It is slightly less calorific, with 509 kCal in contrast to the American Big Mac’s 540 kCal per 100g.

The Italian Big Mac also has less salt and fat, but it does not compare to the world’s healthiest Big Mac (found in Israel). 

READ ALSO: Which stores across Italy sell American foods and drinks?

McDonald’s in Italy also uses EU-sourced ingredients, and the EU restricts the usage of additives and growth hormones. For example Azodicarbonamide which is used to bleach flour, is banned in the EU, but not in the United States, where McDonald’s was still using it as of 2016.

It is true, however, that you can buy beer in McDonald’s in Italy. 

McDonald’s burgers are marginally healthy in Italy compared to the US. Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Italians drive small cars

Fiction (increasingly) – Think of Italian cars, and you might picture a classic Fiat 500 puttering around picturesque cobbled streets – but that’s all changing.

2021 was a historic year for the Italian automotive industry: the sale of SUVs surpassed those of medium-sized sedans for the first time, claiming 48 percent of the market share compared to the sedan’s 45 percent.

That may not match the US, where SUVs and pick-up trucks currently account for around 73 percent of vehicles sold, but it’s a huge increase from 2012, when SUVs made up just 17 percent of vehicle sales in Italy.

There are no free public toilets

Fact (mostly) – You will occasionally find an Italian town or city that offers some free public toilets. For the most part though, you’ll have to pay, including in train stations – and even paid public toilets are few and fair between.

Instead, you’re better off heading to one of the many caffe-bars found all over the country and paying for a euro for a bottle of water or a coffee so you can use their facilities – if you ask nicely, you might even be allowed to go for free.

Metro stations, supermarkets and grocery stores tend to not have any toilets at all, and neither will most clothing stores. One place you will find plenty of free public bathrooms, though, is a motorway service station.

Something that strikes many visitors to Italy as odd is the lack of seats on public toilets. Exactly why this is the case is debated, but there’s a general consensus that the phenomenon has rapidly accelerated in the past couple of decades.

A street sign at an antiques fair in Turin. Free toilets in Italy are few and far between. Photo by rashid khreiss on Unsplash

Italy doesn’t have air conditioning

Fact (sort of) – There’s not no air conditioning in Italy – in fact data from Italy’s national statistics office showed that one in two Italian households had AC in 2021.

It’s far less popular than in the US, though, where 90 percent of households have air conditioning. There’s still not much of a culture of AC in Italy, where many believe it will give you a colpo d’aria leading to at best a sore neck and at worst pneumonia – so even households that have a unit tend to use it sparingly.

READ ALSO: The illnesses that only seem to strike Italians

If your hotel or Airbnb doesn’t specifically mention AC, you can assume it doesn’t have it.

Coca-Cola tastes different in Italy

Fact – While Coke is available almost everywhere in the world, the actual ingredients in Coca-Cola are different in some countries, which could lead some Coke connoisseurs to notice a difference in taste between the products in the US and those in the EU. 

The biggest difference is the regular Coke – in the US this uses high fructose corn syrup while in Europe cane sugar is used to sweeten the product, resulting in a significant difference in taste. 

READ ALSO: Is Diet Coke really banned in Europe?

You’re much more likely in Italy to come across Coca Zero, the zero-sugar version of Coca-Cola, than Coca-Coca Light, the European version of Diet Coke, which has always been hard to find and which some online sources say Italy stopped distributing altogether in 2022.

Coke in the US: different to its European counterparts. Photo by Cody Engel on Unsplash

You don’t need to tip

Fact – It’s not necessary to tip after a restaurant meal in Italy. However, this is a matter of personal choice and you are free to do so (tipping certainly won’t cause upset).

Diners do often leave some change after a particularly enjoyable meal. In terms of how much to give, some people round up a bill to include a tip, while others give what spare change they have.

READ ALSO: What are the rules on tipping in Italy?

Some people may also opt to tip other professionals as well, such as taxi drivers and cleaners, but again – this is optional and typically not a large quantity. In some apartment buildings, residents may give a Christmas card with money inside to the portiere (doorman) as a kind of annual tip.

All cars are stick shift

Mostly fact – In the United States, stick shift vehicles are becoming a thing of the past, but in Italy they are still very much being bought and driven.

As of 2018, around 20 percent of new cars sold in Italy were automatic – which is much higher than the less-than-one percent sold in the 1980s, but still a lot less than the US’s figure of 96 percent.

That said, around 70 percent of SUVs sold in Italy use automatic transition, so with the popularity of these larger vehicles on the rise, you can expect to see more automatics on Italian roads in the future.

What do you think? Have you noticed any other common beliefs or misconceptions about Italy in the US, or elsewhere? We’d love to hear from you in the comments section below.

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