64 Relationship Marketing
Case 2.1 Nestlé Buitoni: The house that mamma built
This case was written by Edward Hickman, a Management Consultant at Robson
Rhodes, and Professor Erich Joachimsthaler Visiting Professor at the Darden
Graduate School of Business Administration, University of Virginia. The case is
reproduced with kind permission.
The Italian house of Buitoni was the third largest food manufacturer in Italy
when taken over by Nestlé in 1988. Buitoni is the central plank of Nestlé’s
pasta and related products group and is the company which Nestlé was
using to experiment with new marketing ideas during the early 1990s.
Through a number of different marketing programmes, Buitoni, the UK
subsidiary of Nestlé, built a large database of consumers, which became the
basis for the launch of the Casa Buitoni Club. The club consisted of a col-
lection of British consumers who share the Italian love for food. The club
was the centrepiece of Nestlé’s effort of building Buitoni into a global brand.
History*
The company was founded in 1827 in the small Tuscany village of
Sansepolcro, Italy, by Guilia Buitoni, spouse of Giovan Battista Buitoni.
Faced with a sick husband and hungry children, the young Guilia Buitoni
pawned her wedding ring to pay for a pasta-making machine large enough
to produce on a commercial basis. From the beginning, Guilia Buitoni
insisted that her pasta should be of the finest quality, made only from 100
per cent durum wheat semolina.
From these beginnings, Guilia Buitoni founded the world’s commercial
dry pasta industry. The one small pasta factory at Sansepolcro was added
to in 1856 and later in 1878, when further factories were opened in Città del
Castello and Pérouse.
By the turn of the century, the name of Buitoni had become renowned all
over Italy and had won numerous prizes at international food competi-
tions. The company reins were passed down to the direct descendants of
the founders.
In 1907, one of the founders’ grandsons, Francesco, founded La
Perugina, a chocolate and confectionery maker.
The company continued its steady expansion. In 1922, a new plant was
opened in Rome. First steps abroad were taken in 1935, with the establish-
ment of Buitoni SA in France, and a factory at Saint-Maur-des-Fossés near
*The section draws from Jean Heer (1991), Nestlé: Cent Vingt-Cinq Ans De 1866 A
1991 , Nestlé, SA, Vevey.