The wreckage of the Benetton family in sport

The narrative of virtuous sporting entrepreneurship is occupying an increasingly cumbersome place in business universities and has now become a real subject of study. The role of sports marketingthe cementing of the social value of the product, the logic of profit, which mixes with the emotional component, the unshakable loyalty of the fan, who at the same time transforms into Manufacturer And Consumer: All concepts that have been known for several decades, with associated examples derived from real contexts, successful both in terms of sporting achievements and sheer productivity.

Examples that help to illustrate a certain corporate governance of sports clubs, but without taking into account the chiaroscuro. Examples that become models to follow and that simplify and reduce the complexity of the role, Trivializing the concept of sporting success. Examples of individual companies or, in some cases, a network of companies managed by the same group. In Italy, the parable of the Benetton family in Treviso perfectly describes the lights and shadows that lie behind this much-praised rhetoric.