Macron’s Blue Aviators Spur 70% Surge in Tiny Italian Firm

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1:31Emmanuel Macron:Find an agent at c-i-n-f-i-n dot com. Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts. Radio. News. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Tim Stenevek on Bloomberg Radio. Okay, Davos. It's a place to see and be seen. Yes. Or. Yeah, it is. I mean, listen, it's where the world's billionaires go, right? Global leaders gathered this past week at the World Economic Forum's annual meeting. It was also where a pair of blue aviators made headlines and were talked up around the globe. Those glasses became a hot item in demand, according to the company that makes them. For more, we head to Italy and to Stefano Fulciere, the CEO of iVision Tech.

2:17Emmanuel Macron:It's the parent company of the French luxury brand, Henri Julien, which made the glasses. Stefano, good to have you on the program. Take us through what happened since President Macron wore those glasses. What did you see in terms of demand? What did you see in terms of people buying them? Tell us everything.

2:34Stefano Fulchir:Yeah, good evening and thank you to have invited me. So I think that the effect is like a wow effect. It was amazing because from Tuesday, our website went in crash different times. We have received a lot of phone calls because everybody wants to buy something like that, you know? and so they have realized that the ivory is from Marie Julienne and so we are covered for full of requests and now we have immediately restarted to make power for the production of this model because everybody all over the world wanted. So, you know, the sales impact reaction was also amazing and we have sold in one day like the same quantity of one year of production of this model.

3:18Stefano Fulchir:Wow. Which is how many?

3:20Emmanuel Macron:Can you share with us what that number is?

3:22Stefano Fulchir:Yeah, sure. We are not talking about very big numbers because we are a luxury brand. So we produce this eyewear that is in gold lamination, so very particular. And now we are more than 200 pieces in only one day for this model. And so the demand is we receive orders every minute. So we have blocked PayPal three times. So we need every time to make a restructuration of the website. So it's amazing what's happening.

3:50Emmanuel Macron:Which, you know, shares of the company up 40 % so far this month. Today, they're up more than 21%. I mean, off and running. Listen, did you know that he owned a pair? And I'm just curious, tell us about these glasses. What are they made of? I mean, how much do they go for?

4:06Stefano Fulchir:So everything happens in 2024 because we have received a call from the Elysee, from the assistant of the president. and they want to buy one because they want to make a present for a minister in the period of G20. So I remember that I have received this call. And so when we have received this call, we say, wow, this is the president. So we have to do something more and we want to make a present also to give you something. But the assistant told us, OK, please. OK, but we want to pay. So, you know, they try to respect that and they ask us to have everything made in France. So they want something, you know, every face because you want to represent a product from the history of France.

4:49Stefano Fulchir:And I have to tell to you that, you know, Henri Julien is an historical brand. The company is born in 1921 and is a 100 years company. And so when we have sent them, we didn't have any news after that. And we recognize between our customers because some customers during Monday, they start to send me pictures and they say, is it that an original yen? And they say, yes. And so on Tuesday, everything happens, you know.

5:17Emmanuel Macron:So I want to talk a little bit about supply chains here, because what is notable about these frames is that they are made in France. In this day and age, most sunglasses are and most glasses are actually made, at least ones that come to the U.S. are actually made in China. And I'm curious about the supply chain here in a conversation where we're talking a lot about domestic manufacturing in the United States. That's been a big focus of President Trump. How do you keep manufacturing in France and not outsource it to other parts of the world where it would be a lot cheaper?

5:51Stefano Fulchir:Yeah, thank you very much for this question. Because I would like to start from the beginning because our company was born six years ago because we have started in October 2020. so in the middle of the covid period because we have bought the saffilo plant in Udine so one hour from venice and the idea is to restart the production of the iwer in Friuli so Friuli is our region where i live and you know in that period the saffilo has closed the plant and we restart all the production inside and we have a huge capacity here in italy because our main company in italy has a capacity about one million iwer per year so if we are talking about our company at i julienne in france we produce like 1 000 pieces per year so we have a very niche market and for this type of production and what we have done the idea when we have bought at i julienne in october 2023 so after our listing in the stock exchange we have decided to create like a boutique so our idea was to produce in france only some small pieces talking about the historical process everything handcraft with a lot of faces and I would like also to say to you that this eyewear is in gold lamination so what is the particularity of that that inside you can find gold and so it's a very precious material and the final price is not too amazing because we are talking about 650 euros each and talking about gold is a very competitive price but this is something that represent you know the story of the french production and finally i believe that we are based in the two most made important all over the world because if we are talking about highway production made in france is very important like made in italy so you know in france there is the jura area that is very famous like in italy that we have cadore and cadore is very famous for the i wear companies, you know?

7:52Stefano Fulchir:So we have a lot of knowledge, a lot of people, and to create a good eyewear, you need also to have a good staff, good people. Our people inside has 25 years of experience to create eyewear. So eyewear is not really easy to produce something like that.

8:07Emmanuel Macron:So I am wondering, I just want to jump in for a moment because we just have about a minute or so left here. And I do wonder if what the goal is, because, you know, I'm looking at, as Tim mentioned, The stock up about 70 % or so this week, a jump 21 % today. And I'm curious, that kind of can get the attention of investors or other companies out there. Is anybody calling you, reaching out to you to talk about, let's work together? I think about Luxottica, who's out there, who is massive in the glass space. What is your goal? You've got brands like Ray-Ban that are out there. I think we all saw that.

8:43Emmanuel Macron:We thought about former President Joe Biden, who used to wear the aviators as well. So what is the goal? Is Ray-Ban something that you'd like? Is there a company that you're thinking, this is our goal, where we want to be? And just got about 45 seconds or so.

8:59Stefano Fulchir:Yeah, sure. So, you know, Howard is a family company. So working with me, I have my sister and my brother. So it's a family company. I am 39 years old. so we are younger and i believe that we are at the beginning to develop a company we have started only six years ago so we are a small company then you know the biggest one that is luxotica that you have talked about it so our idea is to develop a different type of company after our position of listing we have made some m a and we have by some electronical companies and in the last year we We have presented the first eyewear technological one for blinding people.

9:41Stefano Fulchir:So we have a patent project of that. And our idea is like our name, iVision Tech. So we want to produce something technological. So we are following smart device, smart eyewear. And I believe that in this field, we can do more. So we are a classical company to produce standard eyewear.

9:59Emmanuel Macron:Right.

9:59Stefano Fulchir:But we have all the knowledge for that.

10:01Emmanuel Macron:Well, as we said, the eyeglasses seen around the globe. Really great to catch up with you. Thank you so much for finding time for us and have a good weekend. Stefano Fulcher, he is CEO of iVision Tech, joining us there from Italy.

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