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As a family business, Ermenegildo Zegna goes back to the second half of the 19th century. Angelo Zegna a watchmaker by trade, decided to open a wool mill. Of his ten children it was the last, Ermenegildo born in 1892, who took over what was to become one of the best known and most dynamic family businesses in Italy.
The Zegna wool mill (Lanificio Zegna) was founded in 1910, in Trivero, in the Alpine foothills near Biella. Ermenegildo Zegna’s objective was to produce top quality textiles for men’s clothing by selecting the finest raw materials and introducing product and process innovations and actively promoting the brand.
What seem obvious success factors today were at the time astonishing intuitions. The quest for quality, in fact, meant having an international vision and buying the most prestigious raw materials directly in the countries of origins, in Australia or South Africa. It also took real appreciation and promotion of technological innovation to buy machinery from their rivals, Great Britain. And lastly, they had to devise a communication strategy capable of giving the Ermenegildo Zegna brand world-wide visibility.
Ermenegildo Zegna's insights proved sound: by the end of the '30s the company was employing over 1,000 people and had brought riches to a village still very poor and isolated.
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