Redaelli Velvets
Redaelli is a textile company in Lecco, specialized in velvets and founded by Alfredo Redaelli
Textile company with plants in the Lecco area. The founder is Alfredo Redaelli, fresh from training gained at the Como silk factory school and around Europe, in Germany and France. During 1893, in the Rancio factory, above Lecco, Redaelli Finzi Perrier produced velvet fabrics. In 1911, after the opening of the dye works in Lecco, they set up a new factory in Mandello del Lario equipped with looms and plants for finishing the fabrics.
In recent years, the production of velvet for women’s clothing was joined by that for furnishings, supported by orders for the State Railways. If 1919 was the year of ‘exceptional results’, 1927 was the first season closed in deficit. Mainly due to the general crisis in the industry but also due to fierce internal competition. The interlocutory phase extends into the 1930s, when the company encounters objective difficulties in finding quality raw materials.
Indeed, in 1936 they launched an export front to the United States. In the 1950s, they innovated with a twisting machine and experimentally adopted synthetic fibers. The 60s saw a phase of crisis due to internal management problems.
In 1976 they sold their share package in Tepf, the sector which controls the twisting machine.
The company faces the 80s with a cautious recovery, which is strengthened with the opening to Parisian high fashion and the success of the catalog of printed velvets for women’s clothing. The last decade of the twentieth century opens with an all-time high in profit on the balance sheet, largely due to medium-high quality velvets for women’s clothing and home furnishings.
Redaelli in the 2000s
Redaelli has undergone restructuring and modernization over the years, with the reorganization of the production plants with an innovative perspective.
In 2007 Redaelli Velluti took over the historic German group Girmes GmbH, a well-known worldwide manufacturer of velvets and fake furs, with its brands Niedieck, a historic German brand founded in 1879, and Christoph Andreae, a prestigious manufacturer of velvet for furnishings established in 1687.
The company in liquidation
The company went into liquidation in 2011. According to the report of the judicial commissioners, filed with the Registry of the Court, the company between 2007 and 2010, due to a series of acquisitions of foreign brands and plants successfully completed, saw about 12 and a half million euros vanish, between financial and commercial flows transferred by Redaelli Velluti to its foreign subsidiaries in Germany and the Czech Republic. Added to this economic damage was the one caused by the economic crisis which led to a 50% reduction in turnover. The velvet factory crisis, according to the commissioners, worsened due to an untimely downsizing of the corporate structures, to reduce fixed costs.
The acquisition by the Marzotto Group
In 2012 the Marzotto Group announced the acquisition of Redaelli Velluti. The operation involved the purchase of three of the company’s brands (Redaelli Velluti, Niedieck and Christoph Andreae), the warehouse and the historical archive. Furthermore, the acquisition included 100% of Sametex (manufacturing company with two factories in Kraslice in the Czech Republic) and Girmes (commercial company based in Nettetal in Germany). The acquisition of Redaelli, as it had been for Ratti, takes the form of an industrial diversification operation in a ”collateral” sector of the Group’s core business.
Velvets for upholstery, curtains and contract remain among the company’s leading products. Cotton velvets, viscose velvets, special blends with silk and other natural fibers, beautiful jackquard velvets. Finally, Redaelli Velluti has an incredible color development even in stock service.
In 2015 Redaelli Velluti collaborated with Shima Seiki, leading manufacturer of computerized flat knitting machines which exhibited a new range of high-performance fabrics at Techtextil in Frankfurt.
Read also:
