Who were we

The Pellizzari family: everyone in the company

When life becomes difficult, the family gathers around and gives each other strength.

Here we tell you the story of our family and Fratelli Pellizzari, of our successes but also of our failures. Of when we were on our knees, crying and how we managed, by being together, to overcome difficulties. 

Pellizzari di Arzignano: a family business in the Veneto region

Ours is an ordinary story, similar to that of thousands of other family businesses in the Veneto region. An ordinary story of two parents, Dario and Ines, and four siblings, Michele, Silvia, Chiara and Gabriele. 

All working in the company today, with different but operational roles, arguing, getting angry and sometimes bickering - often over trifles - as in any family :) 
 

Pellizzari: when the name of the company is also ours 

The concepts of company and family have always been confused. Parents and siblings have always worked together and have managed to make two concepts as distant as 'family' and 'work' synonymous.

The company has always been the main topic of lunches and dinners together, and the company - Fratelli Pellizzari - always comes first, as the brothers' wives and husbands well know!  

And yet we say at every lunchtime: "Don't talk about work at the table". And then the countdown begins: three, two, one... and we talk about work!

Falling in love with Pellizzari in Arzignano

Everyone in the family calls the company "La Pellizzari", they all use the feminine form, and confess to being a little (...a lot!!) in love with it. 

We talk about it with pride but also with concern, like a son who sometimes makes us suffer but then makes us proud, who wants total attention and sometimes makes us spend sleepless nights... but how can you not love a son?

We have also felt this passion in many of Pellizzari's employees who are now our brothers and part of the family.

"Yes, they are like brothers to us," says Michele, "they have lived with us through mistakes, crises, fears, they have shared problems and given us a hand to solve them. We really wouldn't know what to do without them: they are our strength and we can never thank them enough. 
 

The beginning of the Pellizzari story, in Costo di Arzignano

But let's take a step back and try to reconstruct the history of Fratelli Pellizzari in Arzignano. 

It is a story of family and work, of sacrifice and satisfaction, of commitment and vision. The story begins a few years before 1967 - the year in which the company was officially established in Arzignano, in the province of Vicenza - with the purchase of the first truck by Pellizzari Dario, the company's founder, dedicated to the transport of building materials. 

"The idea of buying the truck," says Dario, "came to me immediately after I was discharged from military service, when I obtained my licence to drive trucks."

"I was in love with my military truck, I kept it like a jewel and after months and months of driving it, I had a powerful desire to turn this passion into my future job."

One hundred bills of exchange for the first Pellizzari truck

With his clear eyes shining with memories, Dario continued: "I had cramps in my hand because of the number of bills of exchange I had signed... I wasn't used to writing or even reading, eh? But I was used to work". 

The dream came true, the first "used" truck arrived and Dario could finally start his new job. He proudly tells us that he worked day and night and was never tireds. These were years when there was no shortage of work: construction was booming.

People are working day and night to build, renovate, demolish and rebuild.

Pellizzari Dario: 50 years of marriage (and company) after...

Dario's wife Ines, who was his girlfriend at the time, confirms:

"It's hard to say if we were really in love because I never saw him and when he came to visit me at home in the evening, he would do the accounts helped by my mum and organise the work for the following days.
I was basically his secretary, not his girlfriend."

Ines continues, "I don I don't know how I married him..." but as she says this she strokes him. 

The Pellizzari construction warehouse is founded in Arzignano

And it was construction that soon became his second passion.
Maybe it's because his house was being built, or maybe it's because everyone in the family got by with building work, but the fact is that Dario liked the world of construction sites. 

Little by little he concentrated on the sector, serving construction companies and builders with his van, until he became a point of reference for many customers who entrusted him with pick-ups and deliveries to construction sites.

The first company: "Pellizzari haulage and building materials"

Dario's commercial spirit gave him the idea of organising an initial depot for building materials in order to optimise collection and delivery journeys. This first open-air warehouse, on his father-in-law's land, was the embryo of Fratelli Pellizzari. 

The commercial activity began to take off and surpassed, in terms of commitment and turnover, that of transport for third parties. Dario, on his own, could no longer cope with the demands, despite the help of his fiancée and future mother-in-law.

In 1967, Fratelli Pellizzari haulage and building materials company was established and his younger brother, Armando Pellizzari, joined Dario. 

Pellizzari Dario and Armando: two brothers, one force!

The two brothers are a force of nature and devote all their efforts to organising the retail and wholesale business of building materials of all kinds: bricks, cement, lime, aggregates, plaster and insulation.

Armando immediately demonstrated extraordinary commercial and organisational skills, as well as an ability to see the future of the sector, which allowed Fratelli Pellizzari to anticipate times and trends. 

The space where the company was founded, as shown in the photo below, was a piece of countryside made available by Dario's future in-laws. 
Thanks to the contribution of his girlfriend Ines, his parents and in-laws - all involved in helping out - the business of the two brothers began to grow.  

The Pellizzari Arzignano sales outlet in history 

The company developed in what is now the Costo di Arzignano shop. 

That shed made of iron, sheet metal and corrugated plastic, built in a hurry, working day and night, was the embryo of the company.

Dario tells us that in those years they built without paying too much attention to bureaucracy and the building permits for that warehouse were granted at the end, as an amnesty, when the building was already finished...
 

Recently modernised, the Arzignano shop is now a refined shop for home finishes and furnishings, flooring and bathroom furniture, but it still retains the charm and energy of those distant years.

The first floors alongside the building trade

Today's charming flooring and bathroom shop in Costo di Arzignano was a building materials store in the 1970s, without even an office.

Before his military service, Dario worked for several years in Brescia, in the Botticino quarries. That work experience, gained when he was very young, is fundamental for the company. His knowledge of natural stone enabled a fundamental evolution: the introduction of the supply of materials for porphyry, natural stone and marble floors.

However, it was his brother Armando Pellizzari who wanted to push the flooring sector forward and who, with far-sightedness, decided to devote his energies to this sector, which grew from an "accessory" sector to become - thanks to Armando's commercial talent - the company's most important sector.
 
It is thanks to a commercial intuition of his brother Armando that ceramic tiles and cotto were introduced, more than 50 years ago, alongside natural floors. Armando was always at the forefront in welcoming and following the customers who began to buy flooring from Pellizzari and in insisting with his brother on the need to invest in the creation of an innovative showroom that had yet to be seen in Vicenza...

A small new shop for bathroom furnishings in Arzignano

Armando Pellizzari's vision of the future is such that in the mid-1970s he manages to convince his brother to dedicate a new space exclusively to the sale of ceramic and natural stone floor and wall tiles. In this space Armando wanted to set up a series of spaces which, in addition to being paved, would allow the display of sanitary ware, taps, furniture and bathroom accessories.
The first Fratelli Pellizzari bathroom showroom was created on the ground floor of Armando's home, in what was intended as a garage. The show room with its windows can be seen, on the right, in this old aerial photo of the Pellizzari company.

Bathroom settings in the Pellizzari shop

You mustn't think, however, that it is like today's modern showrooms. These are just a few square metres in which samples are displayed and very small "simulations" of bathrooms are made, with a floor and one or two tiled walls.
Sanitary ware and taps are simply placed on these settings to help customers imagine the finished bathroom.

In short, we are a long way from today's reality, but for Dario and Armando - and for our area - this first shop was a revolution! Keep in mind that it is also the first shop specialising in tiles and bathrooms in Arzignano.

Pellizzari of Arzignano began to make a name for itself and to distinguish itself from other competitors thanks to this first, embryonic shop. 

From construction warehouse to tile shop

If, in those days, it was normal for tiles to be chosen in the warehouse, amidst the dust and pallets, now this new display space allows customers to choose their home finishes in a more comfortable environment. Armando's vision is once again correct: customers find a better welcome and a more relaxed space in which to choose.

Another fundamental move, for the growth of the company, will be the inclusion of Armando's brother-in-law, Antonio (but for all of us it was "Toni") Bailo. Toni is a talented interior designer who, brought into the world of tiles, will help the shop and the sector take off thanks to his design skills, his ability to combine materials, his suggestions and advice to customers.

The bathroom and floor tile shop, which started out as a spin-off from the construction warehouse, became increasingly important thanks to Armando and Toni's contribution, until it became the company's most important sector in just a few years.

In addition to the product Pellizzari offers the service: installation and assistance

At the beginning of the 1980s, the supply and installation of indoor and outdoor flooring became Fratelli Pellizzari's most important sector. A technician was hired and trained to manage the construction sites and coordinate the selected local installers.
In addition to Armando and Antonio, other interior decorators are hired who are able to advise customers and design the floors of the house in the best possible way. And that's not all: they specialise in the world of bathrooms: sanitary ware, taps, accessories and bathroom furnishings to the point of providing turnkey bathrooms, complete with everything. 

Pellizzari in Arzignano: 2 divisions and 2 managers

The company has grown and in fact two divisions have been created:

• a flooring and bathroom division dedicated to the family wishing to renovate the bathroom, to which we provide advice, projects, installers and fitters, managed by Armando
• a second division: construction, serving craftsmen, businesses and DIY enthusiasts, dealing with all types of construction materials, both heavy and light, managed by Dario. 

A beautiful new sales outlet in Arzignano

In the 1980s, the two brothers Dario and Armando embarked on an almost science fiction project: to build a showroom dedicated to flooring covering almost 2,000 square metres. One of the largest in Italy. 

Once again it was Armando who was far-sighted: the emergence of many competitors, of many tile shops, prompted him to want to create an unrivalled reference point. The project is so futuristic that it is still relevant today. 
The new shop was built in the industrial area of Arzignano, in Via del Lavoro, and amazed with the originality of its colourful façade, the glass galleries that rise boldly above the roof of the building and the three floors entirely dedicated to settings and proposals for the home. 

Fratelli Pellizzari seems to have launched itself into the future, so much so that it also acquired a plot of land in Gambellara, on the border between Vicenza and Verona, to build a sales outlet that would also serve the Veronese flooring market. 

But the increasingly demanding work and the fact that they worked in two separate locations ended up putting a strain on the union between the two brothers: Dario remained in Costo di Arzignano and Armando in the new, large shop. The long talks between the brothers are more difficult. The sharing of projects, hard work and successes is lacking. The two brothers are both busy working, but the bond that seemed to be made of the same cement they sell begins to creak. 

Until the inevitable decision. 

Dario and Armando split: Pellizzari splits in two

1996 was an unhappy year. Michele tells us: "I had never seen my father cry. It was me consoling him and it was... absurd, unnatural. I didn't know what to do or what to say." 
Dario tells us that he was exhausted: during the day he worked in the warehouse and in the evening he met with the accountant and his brother Armando to find an amicable solution, to divide a company that he did not want to divide.

In the end, the two brothers came to an agreement: Fratelli Pellizzari would continue without Armando and the new shop in Arzignano would be sold to him.

Now it's a matter of managing to pay the huge amount of taxes involved in the sale and completing the Gambellara property. 

We wipe away the tears, get into debt to pay the taxman and roll up our sleeves. You have to get going again. As always in these cases, the family becomes more solid, we gather around the father and we all try to give a hand.

First, Ines, an organised, efficient and tireless wife and mother. 
Then Michele, who decides to leave his two jobs as accountant and journalist to become Dario's "administrative" right-hand man. Fortunately, he is soon joined by Silvia, Chiara and Gabriele, his younger siblings, as well as other talented collaborators. 

At the beginning it was very hard, we also worked on Saturdays and Sundays, there were many doubts and questions, but we managed to reorganise the part of the company that remained after the split and, in the meantime, we also devoted our energies to the work on the Gambellara building, which at the time of the split was an empty and desolate shed with no windows or floors. 

In short, we put all our passion and efforts into it and Fratelli Pellizzari gradually got back on its feet. 

The name is (proudly) maintained and if before it identified the two brothers Dario and Armando, today it identifies the four "younger" brothers: Dario's sons, who have taken care of the company. 
 

The Gambellara (Vicenza) sales outlet

The Gambellara sales outlet was completed and opened in 1997, when the company expanded its operations to include plumbing, with a warehouse of around 2000 square metres dedicated to professionals in the sector.

The large showroom dedicates space to the world of bathroom and interior design and is in an easy to reach location, near the Montebello Vicentino motorway exit, within the Gambellara industrial area.

The company's aim is to extend its range of action thanks to the logistical convenience of the new sales outlet, which is easily accessible from Verona and the Veronese municipalities in the eastern area, such as San Bonifacio, Soave, Caldiero, Monteforte, Arcole etc. 

Building materials, hardware and tools also in Gambellara

In 2008, a new project began to take shape: the construction of a building to be used as a building materials shop and the opening of a hardware and tools shop dedicated to private individuals and craftsmen. 

After the first bureaucratic difficulties and a slowdown due to the terrible crisis in the construction industry, which came at the same time as the new building, the project was completed in 2012 thanks to the contribution of Gabriele Pellizzari, the youngest of the four brothers.

Gabriele took the mission to heart and, on the strength of the experience accumulated at the Arzignano site, completed the project, succeeding in opening the new shop, also organising a space dedicated to colours, for the internal and external painting of the house that he now manages together with Marco. 

In the new warehouse, as well as building materials, everything needed for plasterboard walls and false ceilings and for thermal insulation is stored. In short, the innovative building sector also came to life in Gambellara. 

A new stove and chimney shop for Vicenza and Verona 

In 2013, a mezzanine was built above the hardware and construction shop to accommodate a space dedicated to fireplaces and stoves. The area dedicated to heating with biomass is bright and spacious and will accommodate a nice display. 
The chimney sector, previously represented in the flooring showroom, becomes the subject of a specialised exhibition, as specialised are the guys who follow the customers in the purchase: Gabriele and Antonio. 

Fratelli Pellizzari shops, today