Roncato Collections

RONCATO, A COMPANY, BUT.....
by Arnaldo Gamba
BACKGROUND
RONCATO was established in the late fifties.
Antonio and Giovanna (the founders and parents of today’s owners) both came from families tied to the land, which was typical of the social tissue of the
Venetian hinterland in post-war years.
Also typically the young married couple were always ready to fight and make sacrifices not only to build up the conditions for family growth based on more
certainties, but also to achieve social emancipation purely through their hard work.
Times were hard, life offered few comforts in a poor land, in a poor nation, but in the midst of this poverty the values of entrepreneurship, courage and sacrifice
with regard to work flourished in this case, as for most of the Veneto people with their true pioneering spirit.
The result was the carpenter with his first three or four employees made doors, windows, frames in general and, if there was the chance, also some lovely
furniture, bedrooms..... all hand made or with the first woodworking machines..... and the wife kept the accounts, careful to collect payments and even more
careful over spending.
Fabio was the firstborn and grew up in this environment; he too experienced the poverty, but also the cheerfulness and light-heartedness of that simple world
made up of artisans and country folk who ensure that you “get a good head on your shoulders” by working.
That’s what he did: he was still a boy when he started helping his parents and shared their business worries until they became his own.
In this way the love for “work in itself” became inevitable and the search for satisfaction was appeased by the quality results of the actual work and not just
by the economic results.
When his brothers Remo and Damiano entered the firm they had both been duly educated. The former took charge of the administrative sector and the latter
the technical-production sector and RONCATO, by that time a company, developed even more, opening up to new markets with new types of product such
as furnishings for bars, ice-cream shops and supermarkets.
The subsequent commercial and production expansion persuaded the Roncato brothers to organise the firm in three separate divisions, each with its own
brand:
- “RONCATO DOORS” for the window and door frame sector;
- “RONCATO COLLECTION“ for the production of tables, chairs, cabinets and furnishing accessories;
- “RONCATO GALLERY” to contain the artistic works by Arnaldo Gamba that have been made in RONCATO using the firm’s production systems.
QUALITY OR QUANTITY?
A dilemma that has often arisen in this Veneto family of entrepreneurs, as in others. It is a dilemma that normally tends to set the two values in alternative
and partly opposing directions of development: the first intent on keeping the intrinsic qualities of craftsmanship and the second necessarily aiming at highly
industrialised mass production.
The first direction is undoubtedly in RONCATO’s DNA, but with features that clearly distinguish it from a normal artisan production complex. These features
are: continuous search for innovation, product culture and attention paid to customer satisfaction.
SEARCH FOR INNOVATION
In RONCATO the preservation of values of craftsmanship does not mean that traditional or traditionalistic positions are maintained at all costs, but instead
means using the best that craftsmen can offer to produce continually new and modern ideas, defined individually while following an intensely creative path.
The doors with continuous frame are a shining example of technical/functional innovation allowing new installation methods that give an outstanding
aesthetic result of linear essentiality without corrective trims.
The decorative doors and even more so the artistic doors testify to the iron will to seek a “door culture” whereby the door will finally be considered within
the scope of furnishing design or interior decoration instead of being relegated to being simply part an unfeeling building specification that remains outside
the furnishing design concept.
RONCATO’s refusal of “traditionalism” is also very clear in its choice of modern sales and production management methods.
Much use is made of IT tools both in technically defining the products and in the continual updating of customers through the website.
PRODUCT CULTURE
Manufacturing skill and overall care and attention in the work are not enough at Roncato, where they prefer to make products distinguished by a certain
cultural content.
An example of this can be seen in the fact that Fabio Roncato undertook the difficult restoration of choirs and fittings in general in important Florentine
churches in order to get to know, learn and make his own the taste for superior finishes.
The desire to combine working quality with product culture has led to the Roncato family establishing a very close working relationship with the architect
Arnaldo Gamba.