Tacchificio Villa Cortese, a company specializing in the production of heels and shoe components, boasts a successful story that dates back to 1961, when the entrepreneur Luigi Gazzardi decided to settle its own business in the Parabiago district, one of the most important in the footwear sector for tradition and prestige. Through the years, Tacchificio Villa Cortese has evolved, giving life to multiple optimal solutions, always in line with the needs of the market, following a company philosophy that combines beauty and functionality through a perfect balance between craftsmanship and innovation.
Sustainability, a very topical issue now than ever, is one of the pillars on which the company is founded, as it has always paid particular attention to it well before this topic became renowned.
According to this, Tacchificio Villa Cortese has created several green lines in recent years: well-known is FheelGreen™, a material for molding heels optimized for recycling and performing as much as traditional ABS. At the next edition of Lineapelle, the company will instead present a new line, the FheelBio™ BCA.
Silvia Paganini, Sales and Marketing Director and Davide Caminati, R&D Manager, told us in detail about this new product during our meeting at the company headquarters.
Tacchificio Villa Cortese is renowned on the market as a pioneer in the field of green plastic materials.
SP: “Yes, we have been following this path for a long time because we have always believed it is essential to offer a portfolio of products as broad and customized as possible, in order to satisfy the single requests of customers. Today the great trend is that of sustainability and, with the FheelGreen™ lines, presented in recent years, and FheelBio™, which we will officially launch at Lineapelle, we have tried to create a transversal material, suitable for every type of heel, from chunky to stiletto, so as to be able to offer the customer an optimal solution in terms of mechanical and aesthetic performance for every shape, line and style.
FheelBio™ is a particularly promising material from the point of view of sustainability and performance and also boasts the ISCC plus certification, a guarantee that ensure transparency of the supply chain and traceability of the material.”
The ecological transition must take place both in terms of product and production. What’s your opinion about that?
SP: “We totally agree. We have always understood sustainability as a philosophy that embraces the entire structure and that does not end with the product. As a matter of fact, from the point of view of the process, we self-produce about 60% of our energy needs thanks to modern geothermal systems and photovoltaic panels. A choice undertaken for more than a decade which is proving to be far-sighted, considering the current energy crisis. We also recover every small waste material, although our production does not have lot of it, and we use packaging that minimizes the waste.
Finally, we believe that quality is a key factor for sustainability: an excellent product lasts longer than a low quality one, and durability means reduction of waste. At this purpose, with the same materials, we always choose the most durable ones and we prefer the Italian supply chain, which, in addition to ensuring high quality standards, also proves to have less impact in terms of logistics.”
Davide Caminati, let’s get into the specifics of Fhell Bio™ BCA.
DC: “FheelBio ™ BCA, aims at the complete transition towards alternatives to fossil sources.
BCA stands for Bio Circular Attributed, it is one of the three possibilities that the ISCC Plus certification offers as a derivation of raw material. In this case, being bio-circular means that upstream of the supply chain, organic raw materials from waste, such as exhausted oils, domestic waste separation, in short, everything that previously was an organic resource and has become waste after a domestic or industrial use, must be preferred instead of oil.
The approach that follows the ISCC certification is what is called Mass Balance: each actor in the supply chain must be ISCC certified and must keep a balance of sustainable materials in and out of production. The heels we deliver are accompanied by a sustainability declaration which indicates the quantity of sustainable raw material allocated through Mass Determination. To date we use ISCC certified material with a quota attributed to BCA at 65 and we aim to obtain 100% by the end of 2023.”
Has this material already been produced? Do you expect it to be well accepted by the market?
DC: “To date we have carried out the various routine tests, passed in terms of mechanical performance and quality, so we are ready for production. We are now concluding the first sampling agreements, which we hope will increase right at the fair. Considering that, despite the high percentage of sustainable material, this material also has low costs compared to other ‘green’ alternatives, we expect a good response from the market.”
Will Fheel Bio™ replace FheelGreen™?
DC: “No, these two lines will be placed side by side within our range. As we said at the beginning, we want to have a broad product portfolio capable of satisfying any need; the ecological transition can take place in different ways and, when customers will express their needs to us, we will have all the tools and solutions to be able to satisfy them in the best possible way.”
Silvia Paganini, Sales & Marketing Manager