Santoni CEO Giuseppe Santoni talks craftsmanship and stroytelling over Morning Coffee

Born into the Santoni family, CEO Giuseppe Santoni has been immersed in the world of shoemaking his whole life, as his father Andrea established the Santoni house in 1975 when Giuseppe was just seven years old.

Morning Coffee with Santoni CEO, Giuseppe Santoni

Inspired by his father’s determination, hard work and mission for the finest in quality, Giuseppe took on the role of CEO when he was just 21 years old.

A lifetime in the shoemaking industry means he understands the brand, the process and the importance of quality better than anyone and most certainly better than many company CEOs in today’s culture – something he is keen to talk about when we met him on a recent visit to Dubai.

Santoni was in Dubai to open the new Dubai Mall store – a chic and colourful extension of the brand’s ethos of quality and the finest things in life. A&E sat down for an in-depth chat with the man behind this family brand.

Watch the full interview with him above and find out what we learned talking with him below.

Five Things We Learned Talking To a Giuseppe Santoni Over Morning Coffee

A&E TV chats to Giuseppe Santoni over Morning Coffee

His father was his hero

Speaking about his earliest memory to do with the world of shoemaking, Giuseppe said: “I was around my father since I was a child and to be honest he has always been my hero. I basically grew up in the factory and my father was always my example. He has given me a lot of confidence and I really know shoes, the technical aspect of the shoes, which is not typical of a CEO of a company.”

Storytelling is crucial to Santoni

“Through the years people always love to hear stories, and I think storytelling is the emotion. You need to tell the story of what you do in order to explain to people because sometimes people will look at the shoes and not understand how they are so beautiful, how the colour is so deep, how the leather so fantastic and the shoes so comfortable. This is because behind each pair of shoes there is a lot of hard work and research. There’s a lot of elaboration and very smart hands – this is crucial,” Giuseppe told us.

Craftmanship is culture

Santoni said: “We try to keep this very clear in our mind every day. For us, the big challenge is to maintain this philosophy. We have craftsmanship and very expert crafts and we upgrade them to become artists. So within our factory, we create a school where we hire new talent and fresh artisans with new hands.”

Never give up

… Is his personal and professional motto, he tells us, saying it’s something he lives by every day.

He values originality the most

The CEO told A&E: “I say no to people that are not original. I don’t like to work or be surrounded by people that repeat things. I want to spend my time and share my business with people that are visionary and have an original point of view to make things better.”