Eataly Verona with the words of Oscar Farinetti & Stevie Kim

A month after the inauguration of the new Eataly store in the city of Verona, it is interesting to hear the words of the founder of the brand Oscar Farinetti regarding the successes and failures collected during his long entrepreneurial career: if we looked only at this last opening, in fact, we would risk forgetting the path that led to the global spread of the brand, passed through the wreck of idea of the “Osterie Fuoriporta” and the sale of Eataly Japan as a franchise

So let's learn about the life story of Christmas (Oscar) Farinetti, also through his books

Oscar, I have the impression that numbers are very important to you. Are they really a fundamental element for the way you narrate what you do?

Absolutely yes. As an entrepreneur, I believe that without data a speech is just a vain chatter. I have written sixteen books, with a million copies sold in total between the Italian and English markets; with “Store of Courage” I have totaled 300,000 copies sold in the US market alone! Without these numbers, I wouldn't be able to quantify readers' interest. The same thing applies to Eataly: I opened forty-two stores of the brand in seventeen different countries, but five years ago I decided to retire to leave space for my three children within the project. As for me, I currently coordinate two foundations, one that refers to the world of literature and is based in Fontanafredda and a second, based in Verona, of an artistic nature

I am president of the Association of Friends of the University of Gastronomic Sciences and co-owner, together with my members, of the Holden School

It can be said that you haven't retired at all! Your projects always show your affection for Italy and its cultural and food and wine wealth: what do you think is the greatest virtue of being Italian?

I am certainly proud to be Italian and I feel very lucky to have been born here, in the Bel Paese. I could not choose a single reason to recognize excellence in Italy: from UNESCO heritage to the vast biodiversity present on the national territory, everything contributes to making the heritage of this land truly unrepeatable and unique in the world. Eataly is a showcase for part of this heritage

Coming to the new store, could you give us some more information about the characteristics it has? For example, how are staff selected?

As in any Eataly store, employees are selected directly on the territory, to allow the consumer public to always have to deal with local people, who know their typical characteristics and have a strong connection with the surrounding reality. The reference, for the Verona store, is the entire TriVeneto region, which I love for the tourist resorts as well as for the quality of the food and wine offer; what makes the location of the store strategic is then the presence of Veronafiere and Vinitaly, which perhaps you may have already heard of

Just in passing! Speaking of wines: how many labels will be available in Verona? And how many producers?

I believe that approximately we will have 400 brands to offer to the public, with a couple of hundred names related to the territory and 2,000 labels selected for sale. The model that comes closest to us is that of Turin, where Eataly has an equally wide range of wines

To learn more about the contents of the interview, we invite you to retrieve the full video: if you then want to investigate the life, successes and failures of Oscar Farinetti, we recommend reading “Never Quiet — My Story (Unwillingly Authorized)”, published by Rizzoli in 2021.

S&M