by Jacopo Storni
The 33-year-old entrepreneur with 200 employees and 14 locations throughout Italy: «The criticism of Lamborghini? Here in Florence they are jealous. I haven’t lost values like family and work.”
He started at the age of 16 as a shop boy in his father’s restaurant in central Florence. Today, just 19 years later, the same gastronomy has become a sandwich shop with an international brand: all’antico Vinaio has over 200 employees, a turnover of 23 million and 14 restaurants throughout Italy. The motto of Tommaso Mazzanti – 33 years old, hat on his head – is “Bada come la fuma”. His sandwiches are shredded (precisely steaming), super filled, and with unlikely names. The favolosa, for example, is the best-selling: sbriciolona, pecorino cream, artichoke cream, spicy aubergines. Or the Inferno, dedicated to Ron Howard, who revisited his lunch in Florence filled with grilled vegetables, porchetta and hot cream. In this historic shop on Via dei Neri – where there are two-hour queues every day – the stages of the lightning success are written: 2012 best place on Tripadvisor in Tuscany, 2013 best Tuscan street food and fifth place in Italy, 2014 the am most rated venue in the world. For a year now it has been the most social place in Italy, with 600,000 followers on Instagram, 500,000 on Facebook and 300,000 on TikTok. At Bocconi you study the marketing of the Antico Vinaio. And then the partnership with Joe Bastianich, with whom he opened the first restaurant abroad. Not just any place, but Times Square in New York. In the next few days he will be flying to California, because the Antico Vinaio is opening in Los Angeles in April. And to think that Tommaso, Tommy for his friends, doesn’t even speak English.
Sorry, how do you open clubs in America if you don’t speak English?
“It’s a big mistake. Interpreters help me, I study with a local teacher who comes home to give me lessons, but I never felt like learning, neither now nor as a child».
Let’s start with this: At 16 he left the hotel industry.
«I didn’t like going to school, once during class time I ran into the garden to sunbathe on the deck chair I had brought, another time I went to the hairdresser to cut my hair, my friends made me a hooligan called, I stayed at middle school”.
And so he ends up washing dishes in his father’s shop.
«Santa Daniele and mother Fedra were the most difficult employers. They fooled me, they made me cry. Today I thank them, they taught me devotion to work. One morning I didn’t wake up and was late for work. When I arrived my father picked me up and said my behavior was disrespectful to those who kicked butt like them. Since that day I have never strayed from the path. I cleaned pots for a year. Never go to the disco with friends».
The turning point?
«After my father became ill, I took over the management of the sandwich shop, I was just over 20 years old, the queues for the schiacciata were getting longer and longer every day. When we met the employment counselor with my parents, I told him that the Antico Vinaio could have gone over the Florentine walls, he told me to keep calm, after all I was a child.”
The fact is that in 2013 the second restaurant will open in Florence, and the workshop will be transformed into a company. The real intuition was Tripadvisor. And then his amusing posts and videos (made without the help of communication agencies) in which he stuffs dunks while screaming “Mind how it smokes”.
«It was July 2009, I searched for the Antico vinaio on Google, discovered my first review, a foreign customer was enthusiastic about the freshly eaten flatbread. Since then, not a day has gone by that I haven’t gone to Google to read customer reviews, which are growing by the day and come from all over the world. It’s a winning strategy, but also a kind of disease.”
He has become an influencer.
«I do the posts personally, I put love into it because the schiacciata is really good, maybe a communication agency wouldn’t put the same love into it, that also pays off, there is no fiction, I try to make people understand that restaurateurs friends .
Doesn’t success become an addiction for you?
“Success can be dangerous, so I always tell myself to keep my feet on the ground. They told me I’m number one, someone said I’m going to be like McDonald’s, but right now I’m chasing the values of my life, my family and my work.”
In this order?
“Of course family comes first. There must be no turnover that justifies the sale of children. I would also sell the Antico Vinaio for her».
How many hours a day do you spend with your children?
“Covid has made me feel lucky to be able to share time with them, so now some afternoons I stop working and go home. I think of my parents who worked too much to sacrifice time to be with me, I don’t want to be like them.
He turned down an offer in the UAE.
‘They offered me insane amounts of money, even in a country that doesn’t eat pork. But I declined because they would have distorted the project. But now there is a new opportunity and everything should be ready for an agreement in the Middle East, precisely in the Emirates».
Is she stressed?
“Yes, a lot, sometimes I cry, I’m scared, I think it would be nice to go back, but instead I’m happy to have come this far. It’s certainly not easy, I have over 200 families on my shoulders, they are the engine of Antico Vinaio, they are like a family».
Who do you vent with?
“With my wife Clara, half the success lies with him.”
In the last few days he bought a very expensive Lamborghini and took to social media to express his pride in the purchase. It met with heavy criticism.
“My mother, my grandmother, my sister have offended me… there is so much malice. They say I didn’t have to flaunt the purchase, but I shared a joy. I have been going to the Maldives with my family every winter for the past seven years. Should I hide that too? So should my employees hide the fact that they ski in the mountains? The criticism came mainly from the Florentines and this thing hurts me. Maybe they are jealous of my success.”
Also because she loves Florence.
«On my back I have the tattoos of Ponte Vecchio, Palazzo Vecchio, the David, the lily and the Medici symbol. I made them when I was 22 and I don’t regret having them.”
But now he lives in Milan.
“I’m half an hour from an international airport. If I have to leave for America or Dubai, it’s easier».
And that counts for more than the proximity to Florence?
“More than that, no. But a lot, yes.”
January 25, 2023 (change January 25, 2023 | 22:57)
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