Notebook producer Moleskine to extend store network

487.6 million euro

Moleskine, founded by Milanese publisher Modo
& Modo in 1997 to bring the “legendary” notebooks by Vincent Van Gogh,
Pablo Picasso and Ernest Hemingway back to life, is traded at the stock exchange
in Milan. This was the first big initial public offering of the year in Italy.

The opening price of the stock was 2.30 euro,
giving the company – owned by investment fund Syntegra Capital since 2006 – a value
of 487.6 million euro. Moleskine is not the small company it used to be: each
year the brand grows 25% and last year it sold fifteen million products, worth
a total of 78 million euro.

Quadruple growth strategy

The company owes this phenomenal growth to a well-considered strategy, making the company a regular in the luxury branch (a notebook costs
about ten euro). The strategy has four pillars:

• Diversification:
  Moleskine is not only a producer of notebooks. Since two years it develops
  writing materials and luxurious covers for iPads. It also has more and more
  deals with companies and museums, creating customised products.
• Internationalization:
  Moleskine is also looking for more customers outside of Europe: 36% of sales
  are from the United States and 11% from Asia. The rest of sales are made in
  Europe.
• Expanding
  retail network: Moleskine wants to open five more boutiques this year, in Shanghai and
  Beijing. Today the brand has twelve shops, in January there were only seven. It also sells its products in 24,000 bookshops, design stores
  and department stores.
• Online:
  Moleskine also focuses on the internet. The Italians already have a European
  and American online shop, the ideal channels to reach people in countries with
  insufficient sales locations.