Leonardo Del Vecchio
Leonardo Del Vecchio was the epitome of entrepreneurial genius and the symbol of the self-made man.
He embodied everything: the artisan passion, the workshop, the industrial leap, the intuition for what has a future. And, hence, the birth of a leading eyewear manufacturing and distribution company like Luxottica and then the creation of EssilorLuxottica.
“The realization of a lifelong dream,” as he liked to call it.
Above all, Del Vecchio was deeply grateful to those who had helped him along this long path.
A simple person of few words, Leonardo Del Vecchio never forgot those who had stood by his side, and until the last of his days, his thoughts went out to his collaborators.
“In all phases of my life and Luxottica’s life, employees have made a difference. More than brands, more than distribution chains, more than production machinery. The people, whether in the factory or the markets, with their passion for their work, their attachment to the company, and their ability to be a team have made it possible for us to establish ourselves all over the world, to withstand difficult times, and to take full advantage of every opportunity.”
Leonardo Del Vecchio , Founder
It is no coincidence that Luxottica was among the first companies in Italy to introduce a free canteen for employees – it was 1972. And, again, it is no coincidence that in the years of the global financial crisis of 2008-2009, Leonardo Del Vecchio developed the model of what later became known everywhere, and then followed by many, as “Luxottica Welfare”: a set of concrete measures ranging from microcredit to the purchase and reimbursement of textbooks, from shopping carts to scholarships for deserving students and employees, from tuition reimbursement to summer camps, insurance coverage of medical expenses, listening services, contributions for daycare center and much more.
It is, again, at a challenging time for the whole world, such as the one experienced with the Covid pandemic, that Leonardo Del Vecchio immediately intervened, allocating 100 million euros to help struggling employees and their families and by donating money and tools to support health facilities.
Thinking about the collaborators and, together, the community.
Leonardo Del Vecchio, who was born a fatherless child, always had in the “factory”-as he liked to call it- his second family, alongside the family he had personally built.
Already famous and very wealthy, he was happy if he could spend time in the departments, look at each new model of eyewear produced, and meet again to say hi to those “young people” who decades earlier had given him confidence by working tirelessly with him to bring Luxottica to life. Young boys of 15/16 who with him – himself in his early twenties – had grown up from compulsory schooling to become managers and participants in Luxottica’s extraordinary adventure.
With everyone and over time, he always shared his achievements through annual performance bonuses, the gift of Luxottica shares on the occasion of his 80th birthday and widespread shareholding plans.
“I grew up without a father and in an institution. Growing up without a family is something you can’t explain unless you’ve experienced it. It marks you.”
Leonardo Del Vecchio was born May 22, 1935, in a “casa di ringhiera” (a typical popular housing with access from an open balcony with a balustrade), in Milan, the youngest of four siblings. His father, a fruit merchant who emigrated from Puglia to the Lombard capital, died of fulminate pneumonia before Leonardo was born. The founder of Luxottica is named after him. At the age of 7, his mother Grazia Rocco, having to work and having no one to leave little Leonardo with, has no choice but to entrust him to the Martinitt (note 1) so that he can have an education and not end up on the street.
When he left boarding school at age 14, Del Vecchio became the so-called ‘fioeu’ di bottega, the store boy, at Johnson, a company that has been making medals for more than a century. He works during the day and takes drawing and engraving courses at the prestigious Brera Academy in the evenings.
He already has his dream: to build something that is all his own. At Johnson he observes and studies how medal moulds are made: he tries to glean the techniques and crafting secrets of the most experienced artisans, then goes back to his station and puts what he has seen done into practice. He becomes a skilled engraver and moulder, knowledge that will prove crucial when he decides to move from medals to moulds for industry and then to eyeglass frames.
It was at Johnson that, while having to engrave friezes on metal frames, he first encountered the world of eyewear.
After learning the craft of engraving and printing the hard way, he decided to set up his own business. He worked by day as a labourer, to secure a pay check, and by night in the tiny workshop he started on the outskirts of Milan.
“For years my lunch has been boiled cabbage. The smell of them reminds me of the great effort, the dreams I had of doing something of my own, maybe small, but where I could put my ideas and skills to use. I always thought I was privileged because of my passion and enormous drive. I was certain that everything would depend on me and my work.”
Thus began, at the age of 23, Leonardo Del Vecchio’s entrepreneurial story as a mould and metal small parts subcontractor, also for eyewear. In that workshop, he used the skills he acquired at the Brera Academy and began producing metal temples with small friezes for some eyewear manufacturers in the Cadore region.
Three years later, it was already time for a change of place: he dismantled the workshop, loaded the machinery onto the old van, and left for the Dolomites. From here he began an unstoppable journey through which Italian frames would conquer the world.
1961 marked a breakthrough year. On April 27 in Agordo, among the peaks of the Dolomites, he founded Luxottica. At his side, he had two partners, Francesco Da Cortà and Vittorio Toscani, owners of Metalflex as well as two of his best customers and solid Cadore entrepreneurs in the eyewear industry, whom a few years later Leonardo would buy out, becoming sole owner of Luxottica.
He chose Agordo because the municipality offered incentives to those who opened businesses in an area that had become a territory of unemployment and emigration since the 1950s due to the closure of old mines.
In addition to the incentives, however, he also found the Agordinians: tireless and loyal workers, without whom we would not have the Luxottica of today. The Tito, the Gino, the Arcangelo, the Bortolo and many others, along with Luigi Francavilla, a skilled worker who left permanent employment in Switzerland to follow Leonardo Del Vecchio without ever having met him before.
He would become his historical right-hand man.
Next to Agordo is Cadore, the industrial eyewear district.
What follows is well-known history. The transition from semi-finished products to the assembly of eyewear sold under the brand name, Luxottica, to the first Mido, the eyewear dedicated fair in Milan.
“With about ten models designed and made by me and Luigi Francavilla, we presented ourselves at Mido. We were afraid we would not sell much; instead, it was an unexpected success. We returned to Agordo tired and happy, knowing that our future had changed forever.”
Since his days at Johnson, Leonardo Del Vecchio had been working with the desire to become the best, to make the best and most innovative product.
He chose to have a verticalized company, from production to distribution; he had an international horizon, looking mainly at the United States; he bought distributors and brands.
Yeah, the brands. Those were the years when Italian style was all the rage in the world with the prêt-à-porter of Armani, Versace, Ferrè. And it was here that one of the most important turning points happened for Luxottica: the alliance with fashion.
It was a revolution because, from a medical device for vision correction, glasses became a fashion and design accessory, an expression of personality.
Luxottica signed the license to produce Armani’s signature eyewear (the designer would remain a lifelong friend and also a partner of Leonardo Del Vecchio), Versace, Bulgari, Prada, Dolce&Gabbana but also Chanel, Ralph Lauren, Tiffany and many others.
But Del Vecchio knew that licenses alone could not be enough, because as they came, they could go. So, he began to build a portfolio of proprietary brands that balanced those of licenses, diversified the offering by acquiring strong, popular, prestigious brands to cater to heterogeneous consumers with different tastes and lifestyles. The first was Vogue Eyewear, followed by Persol, until Luxottica moved overseas for an acquisition not only important in itself but for its symbolic value: he bought Ray-Ban, the manufacturer of sunglasses par excellence, loved and worn in every corner of the planet and sported by movie stars as well as American presidents. After Ray-Ban, he acquired over California-based Oakley, which also brought in Oliver Peoples, thus strengthening its portfolio of brands of excellence in sports performance and luxury.
In 1990 Luxottica was listed on the New York Stock Exchange and in 2000 on the Milan Stock Exchange.
In 2014, after stepping away from the operational management of the company for a few years, Del Vecchio returned to the helm of Luxottica to fundamentally restructure it and complete a project he had long pursued: unite lenses with eyewear by bringing the largest lens manufacturer and the leader in frames under one roof, embrace digital, and complete the distribution platform in Europe.
The dream came true on October 1st, 2018 when the merger between Italy’s Luxottica and France’s Essilor was announced. It was the union of two No. 1s: EssilorLuxottica was born, generating 15 billion in sales, with Leonardo Del Vecchio as the major shareholder.
One piece is still missing. It came in 2021 with the acquisition of GrandVision, a leading optical retailer, an 8 billion euros deal with which it also finally completed its store network in Europe.
The group was solid, and now all that remained was to develop it even further by harnessing technology more decisively. The legendary Ray-Ban become Ray-Ban Stories, next-generation smart glasses with Meta, marking just the first step toward a new technological expansion.
Leonardo Del Vecchio managed to see the first prototypes, the meeting in Milan between the Luxottica founder and the founder of Meta intent on testing the new “smart glasses” became part of history.
A few months later, Leonardo Del Vecchio’s earthly life comes to an end. It was June 27, 2022.
Agordo and the people of Luxottica were in shock. “Even though he was quite aged, we thought he was immortal,” say lifelong friends who kept him company all night while waiting for the funeral (“we couldn’t leave him alone”). Thousands, of women and men, entire families employed at Luxottica, lined up early in the morning to pay their final respects to their President.
But the vision and desire to participate in building an ever-better Country that has always animated Leonardo Del Vecchio is still alive.
That is why he established the Foundation that bears his name: to give back and be participative.
Speaking about one of the first projects carried out by Fondazione Leonardo Del Vecchio (the agreement with the Holy See to save the Fatebenefratelli hospital on Isola Tiberina) he said it was “an immense joy” for him. He added, “I hope there will soon be other initiatives like this that will allow me to give back to our country all the good and beautiful things it has been able to give me.”
In this spirit, the Fondazione Leonardo Del Vecchio continues its efforts, honouring the name of its Founder.
(1) The Martinitt is a historic Milanese welfare institution established in 1532 to provide shelter, care, and education for poor and abandoned children and boys. A similar institution for girls, the Stelline, was established in 1753. In addition to Leonardo Del Vecchio, entrepreneurs Angelo Rizzoli, Edoardo Bianchi, and Marco Dabbene, among others, have been guests of the Martinitt.