FIRST-Class moulds
When you hear the word “Sassuolo”, you might think of the Italian football team, which recontly confirmed again in Italia’s, football top league, the Serie A: but ceramics also wane to mind.
The town near Modena, which has recently become famous for its football team, is one of the Italian industrial capitals tied to the manufacture of ceramic tiles: the main centre of a district that stretches out for several kilometres, around Modena and beyond, and which over the decades has generated a huge business. In the ceramic industry, businesses that manufacture moulds play a key role, le the steel “containers” in which the material that forms the tiles is placed. For nearly half a century, Gape Due has been one or the leading companies in this specific area. Its approach to the industry is captured in the youthful enthusiasm of the founders, in the years of the economic boom.
And now that the sectors starting to recover from the recent global crisis, it has confirmed its status as a solid, reliable and innovative partner, also for those big Industrial groups which, meanwhile, have taken the place of the hundreds of small family businesses of the past.
The fruit of a hard work always pursued with caution, with focus on product quality and the novelties introduced by teehnology.
“Our starting point is always the customer’s need, but the moulds air the result of our ideas, our research”, explains founder and President Michele Gatti, who for years now has worked alongside his son Stefano, General Manager or the company.
“Following the gradual improvements iu technology, today we manufacture moulds that make it possible to produce almost perfect tiles, with minimum calibre differences’.
Moulds of any size, from one centimeter up to a metre and a half on each side: practically all formats available on the market.
New moulds, but also regenerated, since the plants – once used for a certain period of time – are sent hack to the workshop to be restored properly. Experience, flexibility and innovation, combined with a strong logistie organisation, providing immediate assistance to the customer, whatever the requirement: these are the qualities that have
enabled Gape Due to remarkably rise above the critical stage of the end of the past decade, growing further in recent years.
Today the turnover mends 12 million and the company’s exports are worth at least 40%. “We have much bisiness in Europa, but also in the Usa and South America”, and the 70 employees of the company work not only at the headquarters, but also in a small branch that reopened recently, precisely to cope with the increase in orders.
In short: on the eve of its 50th anniversary (in 2017) Gape Due is facing an unprecedented growth problem.
“The year has started well, the backlog has increased considerably”, explain Michele and Stefano Gatti with legitimate pride.
“Now, to face this market phase, we will probably make new investments: we are deciding what are the best steps to take in order to allow the company a balanced expansion in the future”.
