Furla CEO Exits Accessories Company
MILAN — Furla on Thursday reported a 7.6 percent increase in sales in 2021 compared with 2020, while also revealing that its chief executive officer Mauro Sabatini is exiting the Italian accessories company.
Until the arrival of a new CEO, chief operating officer Devis Bassetto will lead Furla.
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Sabatini in January last year succeeded Alberto Camerlengo. The latter was named executive president of the board. Sabatini has deep knowledge of Furla and the leather goods industry. For more than 18 years he was CEO of Effeuno, a leather goods manufacturing company he founded in Tuscany and Furla’s supplier and longtime partner.
In 2018, Furla took control of Effeuno, which is based in Tavarnelle Val di Pesa, a 40-minute drive from Florence. At the time, Effeuno already exclusively produced Furla’s accessories, employing more than 100 workers and producing 2 million bags and small leather goods a year. The takeover was part of Furla’s strategy to invest in Italy and to strengthen the group’s supply chain, boosting production.
The company did not provide a sales figure for 2021 at presstime, but said they were achieved despite the restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan, the main single market for the company. Furla group sales in 2020 totaled 290.8 million euros and in 2019 were 502 million euros. Last year, Sabatini admitted Furla recorded a double-digit decrease in 2020 due to the impact of the pandemic, characterized 2021 as a year of transition, setting the foundations for a recovery in 2022 or 2023.
As reported, Fulra owners are considering a sale of a stake in the Italian accessories company, according to market sources.
Sources say Furla has tapped Lazard as its adviser and a dossier is circulating in Milan. It is also understood that former Valentino CEO Stefano Sassi is consulting with Furla on a potential deal.
In 2016, owner Giovanna Furlanetto set in motion plans to take Furla public, but this project never materialized. Furla was founded in Bologna in 1927 by Aldo Furlanetto, Giovanna’s father.
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