A sustainable business model and new investments that have led not only to tripling the turnover from 2018 to today but also to becoming a virtuous example of transparency and innovation towards all stakeholders. This is the path taken by Pietro Coricelli Spa, an olive oil company founded in 1939 in Spoleto, and led today by Chiara Coricelli, who together with her three brothers represents the third generation. This is demonstrated by the 2023 Integrated Report, which for the first time combines the reporting of financial performance with information in the Environment, Social & Governance (ESG) field in a single document, anticipating the directive on sustainability reporting which will come into force in 2025. ( Video)
“It was a great challenge – states Chiara Coricelli, president and CEO of Pietro Coricelli – from every point of view. A cultural challenge, for the training of the entire company, because it is work that involves every department; a challenge also in terms of drafting, because being voluntary and not mandatory it was an anomalous case, and therefore it was quite difficult to find a solution with the auditing companies”.
“We managed to produce it – he adds – with great satisfaction because it tells the story of the company’s DNA, that is, how operationally, through production, support for the territory, daily precautions, we manage to impact as little as possible on the environment and instead to give new energy and new sources of income for the territory. Therefore, it allows us to improve, on the one hand, and to set a new objective to aim for for the years to come, on the other”.
A commitment to sustainability that is expressed at all levels, from the environmental one to the local community, up to the people who work in the company. “The reporting, analysis and careful evaluation of the supply chain with regards, for example, to all the packaging we use, is done with the aim of increasingly increasing the percentage of production from recycled products, such as cardboard or glass, or even the elimination of secondary packaging materials, such as plastic, and creating a single recycling item with cardboard: this, from an environmental point of view, is the indicator on which we have worked with greater attention”, explains Chiara Coricelli.
“Then we have many initiatives to support the territory – he recalls – which start from the restoration of the old Spoleto-Norcia railway route by bicycle, then through cycle tourism which helps people discover our beautiful Umbria, to activities with the oil cities, such as the walk in the olive grove, various initiatives in which we like to participate personally, because the real contribution we think we are making is to bring a bit of business culture to associations and non-profit organizations, to try to make them grow and therefore to fuel a virtuous circle in our land”.
“In the last edition of the Spoleto-Norcia – he says – we also organized a charity ride, with all our collaborators, in favor of a non-profit organization that was raising funds to buy an alternative means of mobility for the disabled. And this is also very engaging in terms of teamwork”.
In a difficult period for the oil sector, Pietro Coricelli records continuously growing results, also confirmed for the first quarter of 2024, and stands in 1st place as an oil company in the extra virgin olive oil sector in Italy by share of market and as an industry with the highest growth rate among its main competitors.
“We don’t have a ‘recipe’ – he observes – but we can say how we arrived at these results: a lot of passion, foresight and, indeed, sustainability. Sustainability brings together a series of ingredients that lead to good things. We started investing in 2020 in the Italian olive supply chains, through supply chain agreements, to give greater profitability to the farmer, and thanks to our 100% Italian product line we have gone against the trend compared to the extra virgin market”.
“So it was a very important driver in which we have always strongly believed and which today has also brought us a great contribution to this growth”, he concludes.
