Crisis, declining sales, layoffs. These have been recurring words accompanying surveys of the leather goods sector in recent months. According to the recent report by the Confindustria Moda Study Center for Assopellettieri, both exports (-11.8 percent) and turnover (-12 percent) fell by double digits in the first quarter of 2024. Turnover contraction touches half of the companies surveyed; a quarter experienced a drop of more than 20 percent. The number of layoff hours is also significant: 11.3 million were authorized between January and April 2024, 155.6 percent more than in the same period in 2023. This is the highest figure in 15 years, up 305.5 percent from January-April 2019.
If forecasts for the second quarter estimate a 6.8 percent drop in turnover, trade associations and institutions are running for cover. From parliamentary questions on the need to activate initiatives to support luxury leather goods, to the request for urgent action to prevent the collapse of the sector by Confartigianato and Cna Marche. Up to the activation, in Tuscany, of an ad hoc table to support and relaunch the fashion sector. Also from Tuscany is the request to the government for specific social shock absorbers and measures on the credit front. But will the timing of the policy be fast enough? And what, instead, according to entrepreneurs, are the strategies for getting back on track?
There are four paths to take, according to Andrea Calistri, owner of Sapaf, with long experience in trade associationism. “Among the strategies that companies can adopt,” he says, ”there is first of all to look for work even of a large but smaller scale, restructuring production capacity on the fragmentation of demand. On small quantities the work is there, but the change of direction is difficult: in recent years everything has been structured on large numbers. Another way is to exploit lesser-known markets, such as South America and North Africa, or even to redesign a more flexible production system. Finally, a topic close to my heart: training. We need a proper system that trains new leather craftsmen, recreating know-how.”
“In these difficult economic and world times we are trying to expand our clientele abroad,” is the comment of Martina Squarcini of Conceria Il Ponte. We are focusing on the Asian and American markets, participating in trade fairs, but also promoting our articles on social channels and on the website, with the aim of spreading the culture of our article, vegetable and LWG Gold certified, which there are only a few of us producing and which I believe has a good future ahead. The phase we are going through is very similar to that of Covid: I hope that the government will promote policies along the lines of those implemented during the pandemic phase, starting with the suspension of funding that would be crucial to better cope with the last months of the year.”
