Alleged Armani gangmastering, two Italian suppliers involved: here's who they are

Alleged Armani gangmastering, not only Chinese factories: two rich Italian suppliers also involved. Here's how much they earn

There has been a lot of talk about the four Chinese companies that produced in the Milan area with workers who were mostly clandestine, poorly paid and in precarious conditions, bags and belts for Giorgio Armani through the GA Operations. But the lesser-known aspect of the story concerns the first link in the chain: the two companiesone from Milan and one from Bergamo, with which GA Operations, commissioned by the Milan court, signed i contracts for the production of accessories. It's about the Manifatture Lombarde srl based in the Lombard capital and the Minoronzoni srl of Bergamowhich – it should be specified – Not are under investigation. However, the judges write in the judicial administration decree that “the supplier company only nominally has adequate production capacity and can compete on the market only by in turn outsourcing the orders to Chinese factories, which manage to reduce costs by resorting to the use of irregular and clandestine labor in exploitative conditions”.

But Armani's two suppliers, who subcontracted to the Chinese, are in excellent economic health.

Lombard manufacturing, 50% owned by Alessandro Budel and his mother Katia Delfante, it was founded in 1971 by Claudio Budel (Alessandro's father) who also lost the trademark war with the giant Hermès in 2007 for the use of the “H” logo and who in 2018 he declared to Ansa: “My dream is to bring leather goods back to Milan: because leather goods are not Florence, they are Milan”. In that year the company, then called High Class, was selected by Intesa San Paolo in the Winning Enterprises program also “for its ability to combine Italian know-how with technology”. The numbers of Budel's company in the last three years post pandemic are those of exponential growth: 22.7 million euros in revenues in 2021, 25.1 million the following year and 35.7 million in sales in 2022, the latest available budget. With a net worth of 3.2 million, Manifatture Lombarde has debts of 19.2 million of which 5.8 million to banks (Intesa Sanpaolo, Bpm and Bnl) and will have to repay in three years 1.5 million of bonds subscribed by Invitalia under the SME Heritage Fund.

There Minoronzoni was founded in 1986 and is entirely owned by Giacomo Ronzoni, born in 1973 in Bonate Sotto (Bergamo) and former Atalanta player. The entrepreneur told “L'Eco di Bergamo”: “it was the Eighties and I went to a tennis match where I met Luciano Benetton: a few months later I moved to Petosino and started making leather belts for the Treviso company Then we moved to Ponte San Pietro and here we gradually grew, with the world of brands for which we produce belts: from Armani to Trussardi, H&M and Zara, up to the American brands that in 1990 supplied themselves in Bergamo: Gap, Banana Republic, Ralph Lauren”. And even the numbers for the last three years of Minoronzoni show an upward trend: from 38.3 million in 2021 to 39.4 million the following year up to 42.3 million in 2023 (the balance sheet closes in March). The company has a net worth of 10 million and 19.5 million in debt, of which 11.6 million is due to banks.

In short, those of the two suppliers of Giorgio Armani's company are significant numbers, but evidently not such as to allow their owners not to subcontract the orders to the Chinese, complete with exploited workers. And now Pierantonio Capitini, appointed judicial administrator of GA Operations, who will have to review the supply contractswill you confirm them?