La Molisana turns 110 years old. It is a special occasion for Molise’s best-known company, which on Tuesday, Oct. 25, at 10:30 a.m. at the pasta factory in contrada Colle delle Api in Campobasso, will present a stamp created by Poste Italiane for the company’s 110-year history. A philatelic cancellation ceremony by Poste Italiane is also planned.
This is another important milestone in the more than 100-year success story of the Campobasso-based pasta factory. In fact, it was 1912 when the Carlone family started the La Molisana pasta factory as an artisan workshop that within a few decades made a name for itself as a reference company in the field of semolina pasta production with excellent product quality.
In 1927 La Molisana was awarded the First Prize Grand Palm of Honor and Gold Medal at the Rome sample exposition for the production of excellent pasta products. The first La Molisana trademark, on the other hand, dates back to 1966, depicting four ears of wheat intertwined to form the background of the company’s name.
It was also in 1991 that the mill was built just a few steps away from the pasta factory as the completion of the production chain from the selection of the best grains to the production of the finished product. But not everything went right, because as is well known the pasta factory entered a serious crisis at the beginning of the new Millennium and a change of ownership was necessary to relaunch the brand.
In 2011 the Ferro group, known for its great economic solidity, decided to take over the pasta factory and focus everything on the integrated pasta supply chain from the grain of wheat to the plate on the table. Within a few years La Molisana was back to being one of the most popular pastas in Italy and now a brand appreciated in much of the world.
In 2013 the stroke of genius, the creation of the spaghetto quadrato, a type of pasta that in place of the old spaghetto alla chitarra has become so popular with consumers that it has in fact been imitated by many competitors. In the same year, the La Molisana group recorded a growth trend of 146 percent in a period that was certainly not easy for the Italian industry.
Instead, the Ferro group managed to consolidate La Molisana with other innovations such as a line of high-quality semolina and flour and packaging that has won international recognition and has recently experienced a turn toward eco-sustainability, thanks to the totally recyclable wrap in paper.
But La Molisana has been able to combine great product quality with an innovative image and great aesthetic sense. The focus on high quality has meant that since 2018 La Molisana can boast the title of ‘only Italian wheat’ thanks to a supply chain with more than 1,450 farmers and a traceability path followed to the smallest detail.
The last few years have been ones in which La Molisana has become a sponsor and partner of important sports clubs or athletes of the highest level. Suffice it to mention the sponsorships of soccer clubs such as Benevento first, Roma, Milan and Inter later, as well as Campobasso’s A-1 women’s basketball team, Magnolia, which bears the very name of La Molisana. To end with Olympic 100-meter champion Marcell Jacobs, who a few months ago became the company’s brand ambassador.
