The iconic Italian component brand, Campagnolo, may be experiencing a different kind of "shift" in the workplace, as employees prepare to strike in the wake of job cut-backs.
According to reports, Campagnolo is planning to scale-down operations at its Vicenza facility and move production to Romania in order to reduce costs.
Needless to say, this has caught the ire of the company’s nearly 400 unionized employees.
Union officials have condemned the labor cut-backs by saying:
“It’s a shortcut that leads nowhere.” "They should instead invest in making the Vicenza facilities more efficient and competitive to meet “the new challenges of the global market.”
"We’re talking about a firm with positive financial statements and a prestigious
‘Made In Italy’ brand that makes a distinction of its quality in both the professional and amateur sports markets."
“We wouldn’t want it to become, in more or less the short term, substantially ‘Made in Romania.”
In response to the publicity, Campagnolo has issued the following statement:
The Campagnolo business, manufacturer of high-end components for racing bicycles, has decided to open a redundancy procedure for 68 of the 399 staff at the production site in Vicenza.
This decision results from necessity to put in place a business plan presented to the trades unions and staff organisations, necessary to ensure the continued production at that site, which also houses group functions and activities related to new products and new technologies.
The business plan aims to recover market share and margin which have been eroded in recent years due to the decline in competitiveness of the manufacturing carried out at the Vicenza site.
Changed market conditions on the one hand and ever more intense competition on the other risk forcing the business out of the market, since it cannot rely alone on the strength of its brand and high performance products.
It is now necessary to regain competitiveness by restructuring the Vicenza site, giving it a mission focused on innovation and product development, on which the business has the firm intention of implementing and concentrating all necessary investment.
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