Antinori among the “bigs”, Donnafugata among the “small caps” at the top of Pambianco LeQuotabili22

The historic Marchesi Antinori, a leading reality of Italian wine, led for 27 generations by the Antinori family, which today sees Albiera Antinori as president, together with her sisters Allegra and Alessia, and CEO Renzo Cotarella, leading the group made great by Piero Antinori, among the “bigs”. Donnafugata, one of the wineries that marked the renaissance of Sicilian wine, now led by Jose and Antonio Rallo, who together with their family and president Vittorio Ruggieri, carry on the project created by Giacomo Rallo, among the “small” ones: here are the best ones in the Pambianco Award “LeQuotabili22”, awarded to Italian companies in the “Fashion, Beauty, Design and Wine” sectors that possess the economic, financial and positioning characteristics, to be listed on the Stock Exchange, with the most success in a period of 3/5 years. Award that, it must be said, does not mean that these companies are intent on going down the path of listing on the stock exchange, but that they would have the characteristics to do so. And on the podiums of wine, along with Antinori and Donnafugata, there are also other different, but very prominent, realities of Italian wine. Following Antinori, in fact, among the large companies are Santero, the celebrated sparkling wine house in Santo Stefano Belbo, among Italy’s most active in marketing and advertising, and another name that represents the history of Italian and Tuscan wine such as Marchesi Frescobaldi, a group now led by Lamberto Frescobaldi, the story of a family that has been making wine since the early 14th century.
Among the “small caps”, or those companies with a turnover of between 10 and 50 million euros, on the other hand, on Pambianco’s wine podium, behind Donnafugata, is Carpineto, an articulate entity led by Antonio Michael Zaccheo, with five Tuscan estates in the territories of Chianti Classico, Nobile di Montepulciano, Brunello di Montalcino and Tuscan Maremma, and “xtraWine”, one of the longest-running and most important online wine stores in Italy. Overall, the study defined the ranking of 30 companies in the fashion sector, 20 companies for design, 10 companies for beauty and 10 companies for wine.
“This award”, said Vittorio Ruggieri, president of Donnafugata, “honors us and is a recognition that encourages us to pursue with determination the strategic vision shared with Gabriella, José and Antonio Rallo. We will continue to invest to grow in quality through the acquisition of small plots and vineyards of recognized value; we aim to strengthen communication activities, especially abroad, leveraging what makes us unique such as the link with the territory and the art and wine dialogue; we will still develop wine tourism at our five wineries to offer original and engaging experiences. It is understood that all the goals we set for ourselves”, Vittorio Ruggieri concludes, “will be achieved by continuing to put to good use the main lesson left to us by Giacomo Rallo, Donnafugata’s founder, which is to always focus on human resources as a competitive factor for success”.
In defining the ranking, Pambianco LeQuotabili annually considers the financial statements of unlisted companies in the four target industries and sorts the companies into a ranking according to the quotability model developed by Pambianco based on the following parameters: percentage growth, average ebtitda, brand awareness, size, export share, distribution control, and market segment. Overall, Pambianco explains, the 2022 analysis studied a sample worth €21.9 billion in 2021, up 27% from 2020, and also surpassing the pre-Covid 2019 figure of €20.1 billion. In addition to revenues, ebitda also scored a significant improvement in 2021, at €4.8 billion, or 22% of revenues, doing better than 2019 when it stood at 18.3 percent to €3.7 billion. Looking in detail at the individual sectors, double-digit growth can be seen in all segments. In the case of fashion, growth stood at +27% (the sample is worth €14 billion in revenues). Even better in terms of percentage change did design, where the increase in 2021 over 2020 stood at almost 30% for a total turnover of 4.2 billion euros. The sample of wine companies analyzed saw +28% revenue growth while in beauty the progress was 21%. In terms of geographical distribution of companies, considering the overall panel of the 70 “big” companies considered, we see that even in 2022 as many as 24 companies are based in Lombardy, 15 companies in Veneto and 10 companies in Emilia-Romagna. Overall, only 10 regions are represented by their “champions”.

David Pambianco, CEO Pambianco srl, commented, “that the Pambianco Awards is also an opportunity to recognize and enhance the resilience and business acumen of our companies. The total value of the 70 best-in-class companies considered was not only up 27% over the previous year, but more importantly, higher than even pre-Covid 2019”.