30 October 2025
Author: Marco Francesco Mazzù In cooperation with Macron management and Antea Gambicorti
Abstract:
It was 7pm and the sun was going down the hills of Valsamoggia. The CEO Gianluca Pavanello was observing the work in progress for the Macron new headquarters : two buildings of 22.000 sqm crossed by a canal. Facing the building site of the new offices and distribution center, symbol of the fast growth of the company, the CEO asked himself: “We have done so much until now, but right now we are in front of a crossroads. How can we continue to achieve growth in the complex context where we operate?”. From a unique Italian distributor of baseball equipment on behalf of MacGregor USA and other American baseball brands, in 1971, Macron then twisted its offer, entering in the arena of professional football sponsorships. This signed the company trajectory towards the sports sponsorships, before only in Italy and then also abroad, until to reach today 71% of revenues abroad and 29% in Italy. The Macron rapid and stable improvement, especially in teamwear as its core business, reached the highest point in 2018, when the UEFA gave to the company three recognitions: the definition of Macron in “The European Club footballing landscape” (2018) as the third most important supplier in the world of European football, after Nike and Adidas; the decision to choose the Italian sports brand as its official partner for the supply of apparel to the smaller football federations for the years 2018-2022; choose again Macron as Official Referee kits supplier to all the referees of all the UEFA competitions (the most important: Champions League, Europa League, Euro 2020 and Nations League). However, despite these important recognitions, Macron management team was aware that a new step should be undertaken in order to compete in a global market with some global player (Nike, Adidas and Puma) and several aggressive attackers. How can Macron sustain its growth? How to keep growing internationally? What marketing levers to activate to stimulate awareness, trial, engagement and loyalty? Are strategic sponsorships still a valid growth tool or should be modified? Those seemed some of the core question Pavanello was about to discuss with his management team.
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