Ep. 609 Ludovica Leone Get US Market Ready With Italian Wine People

Thanks for tuning into my new show. Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. I'm Steve Ray, author of the book how to get US Market Ready. And in my previous podcast, I shared some of the lessons I've learned from thirty years in the wine and spirits business helping brands enter and grow in the US market. This series will be dedicated to the personalities who have been working in the Italian wine sector in the US, their experiences, challenges, and personal stories. I'll uncover the roads that they walked shedding light on current trends, business strategies, and their unique brands. So thanks for listening in, and let's get to the interview. Hi. This is Steve Ray, and welcome to this week's edition of Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. I'm, pleased and honored to have as a guest today, Ludovica Leonay, who is, Dodoreza, Ludovic is the director of the global MBA Food and wine in, at the Bologna business school. And I've had the pleasure of, lecturing at the class a a couple of times. In person and also most recently in Zoom. So, Ludovigua, why don't you give us a little intro to yourself before we get started with the interview? First of all, thank you, Steve, for this invitation, and, I'm really pleased to be here. So as you said, I'm Ludovie Caliona, and, director of the global MBA Food and wine at Bologna Business School, you know, which is the Business School of the University of Bologna. And, as most of you will know, the University of Bologna as the oldest university in the western world since it was born in, ten eighty eight. The, the university, of Bologna Business School was born just twenty years ago. So is, pretty young. And, our program, the global MBA food and wine is at IS tenth edition this year. So it is also a young program, which is growing really fast. What was I didn't realize it was that new. What was the impetus? Why did they create that? Well, the the the global MBA or the business school? I get the business school. The the global MBA. So the the global MBA, first of all, it was born. The global MBA food and wine is just one of the trucks. Of, bologna business school global MBA. We, decided to develop a global MBA, which is global because we have both professors and students coming from a local board, and we decided to to create an MBA that was not directed just to the, I mean, a general MBA, a generalistic MBA, but, we wanted to, to offer a program that was specialized, in what are the the pillars of made in Italy productions. That is why our global MBA is divided in different trucks. And we have, of course, the food and wine, and then we have the super car, super bikes and motorsports since we are in bologna, so at the center of the of the Motor Valley. We have, a design, fashion, luxury goods, track, a track in automation and robotics, since I don't know, how many people are aware that in Moronia, there is a huge production of automation and packaging value also, and agreed energy and sustainable businesses. Again, in the middle of Romania, there is a, huge and rising interest in, green businesses. So this is something that, we, we decided to, to focus on. So our students, in the first part of the master, in the first part of the course, have all, classic MBA courses. And then, in the second part of the of the master, they specialized, in the industry, they, they selected them. That is a little bit, the, the distinction, the distinctive characteristics that define our program compared to other programs, our, other MBA programs around the world. And, and, let me just say that, we're really proud to be to be the only MBA that, offer the, this kind of, our specialization So that is why we we decided to to launch this program to actually put in practice, what our faculty was doing research on and, also to respond to really the request from the companies that, we were working with because, you know, companies are always looking for new talents, international talents, especially in Italy, you know, where we we are looking for the internationalization of our company And so to attract talent, in those specific industries, we needed, a special pro special program. So that is a little bit why. The rationale why we started this program. So few years ago. Can you give me a sense of, the staff that's supporting at the number of people in, in the system? And I I do wanna give a call out to Barbara Beyondy, who is the one who coordinates, everything that I do with Belonia Business School. But why don't you give me a little background on, number of people? Okay. So, the number of employees or the number of people working for the which kind of number? The staff at the university that are directly related to the business school. Okay. So, I can give you this number in a second moment because I don't have it in the moment, how many people work. Yeah. The faculty members, I can tell you that are more than two hundred in general at the at the school. We have, more than five hundred companies that are in our network. And, we have, in general, the school has, eleven full time masters, both in English and in Italian, and thirteen executive masters. Plus, we have a lot of open programs or custom programs that we do directly with companies. And so this is, a little bit, the, the numbers in terms of how many how many, masters, in terms of many people, every year, we graduate to more or less six hundred students, both young people, so let's say young after, I mean, people that are, that already have their, bachelor degree or, alpha and alpha, three hundred managers and entrepreneurs. So people that are there for executive programs. So So it's pretty large. Also, One of the things I've noted, this is more of a statement than a question, is very focused on the practical aspects of all this and and the and the idea of working with companies to help shape, you know, that which you teach and and get in turn opportunities for their students so that they get real world rather than just academic, experience. And you're dealing with five different tracks. There's motor sports because I guess that's good. It's Modena. That's kinda where all the, the car companies are located? Yes. But also in bologna, you have, so in modern, you have Ferrari, but you also have between bologna and modern, and you have Lamborghini, you have Bucati in, in in Bologna. We have the Lara in, which is in Parman, near Parma. So we have very, very, very concentrated network of, of companies, in the Motorola. And, I'm sure I'm forgetting, south You mentioned it was the oldest university in the world. The university itself is in downtown bologna. Some of it got destroyed during World War two, but rebuilt. I particularly remember, visiting the medical auditorium, which was this beautiful wood building. But the graduate school is housed in Avila that, dates back a couple of hundred years. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Well, the the headquarters of the Bologna business school are on the heels of Bologna. You know, Bologna is not a very big town, is a university town. The the the villa is located just, ten minutes, from downtown Bologna. And, is, is called the villa Guastavilani originally was, owned by a cardinal, named the Guastavilani, and it was this, is summer residence, let's say that usually, you know, they had the the downtown, winter residence, and up on the hills where it was fresh air during summer they used to say. And this, Vila is, say that this sixteenth century and is, one of the elements that, say that, impressed the most, both our students and our faculty who love being there, starting and working. And, but the villa is very, at the moment, the villa is not enough. So because, of course, we are growing a lot. So we, we are, building is exactly in front of the Villa. We we are building a new campus, which has been designed by, a famous architectural, office from Bolonia, working on sustainable projects. And so in, let's hope that soon, we will see our new campus just in front of, of the villa. Wow. I'm looking forward to that. The, I would comment for the, people who are listening to that. I can't show you photographs, but the the classroom I think that most of the the courses are taught and certainly the ones that that I like to have once a semester is this old fifteenth century thing with frescoes on the ceiling and the big wooden beams and all. And in this huge fireplace classic, you know, drawing room, I guess, from the fifteenth century or sixteenth century. And then they have a a big wire with a projector coming down right over the head of the of the lecture to a screen. So they've adapted this wonderful old room to, modern, teaching methods. Okay. One of the things that you guys impressed me was, your connection with everything happening at Verona Ferre, and particularly with with Stevie Kim. Stevie was a a commencement speaker about three years ago. She's the force, of course, behind the Italian wine podcast that we're listening to right now. And you also have done a couple of, intern programs with her kind of as a result of the, commencement speech. Can you tell us about your relationship with all that's going on in verona. Yeah. So, of course, so first of all, Steve is, you know, is a she's a force of nature. So we, the moment we met, I think that we, we met in, New York a few years ago, thanks to Marco Caprai. And, we immediately started to talk and the possibilities of collaborating, with, with our program. And, what, we what we did was, of of course, inviting, we need an international for, you know, small seminars, and Dan Stevie, offered, to our students several times in terms of position because as you mentioned before, we have a strong relationship with many companies and, both in food, and in the beverage. So in the, not only in the, in the wine, but, in general, in the beverage, in We need an intonation is one of these, of these companies. And thanks to these companies, so thanks to to Stevy, among the others. We were able to, to attract our students, to attract talents, And also to, to let this talent remain in our territory, because Stevie, in the past, and we need an international hire to few of our students. So it is very interesting. The fact, you know, it's very international environment. So it was not really difficult for them to find an invite, you know, vibrating environment very active. And, they always tell me that they learn a lot, from Stevian, from Midland International. So this this is just one of the the things that we did together. But as you also mentioned, we, you know, in our course, in our, global MBA, we have a course, that I teach and it's called business development lab. And, it's not actually frontal classes, more than laboratory where we work with students and companies as students where, like, consultants, and we work on a specific project. And, for, yeah, let's say that twice, so we worked with the international on on the projects. So, for example, last year, we worked with a group of students on a new version on, one to one, which I'm sure you know is the the, b to b fair of an international. And the students worked, they're all free to develop new, a new format, new ideas, new contents, you know, speakers, suggestions for, enhancing the fair. And, of course, COVID arrived. So everything was, the the ideal of the of the event was in presence, but then it was not. So that that's, a little bit, whatever. So the the classes are taught in English, which is the only way that I could. But then COVID came. So how does, a university class that really is defined by the physical presence of international students in in this international city of Bologna. How did you adapt to the impact of, COVID? Well, we we reacted very fast to, to the outbreak of COVID because before, the Italian government, launched the the lockdown. We decided to, to move everything online and, to, you know, to to avoid the, classes in presence last year. And, we we were able to, I mean, to transport everything, all the classes, all the seminars online. And, this was, of course, a PT for many students that, arrived in Italy to to visit companies, to visit fairs to interact with people from the industry travel the country and see directly what are the specificities of our productions, and we try to balance these with plenty of webinars. So leadership talks, I mean, virtual company tours, and everything that we could do. And, this was last year. While we were a little bit, I mean, scared of what would happen this year, because we were, I mean, from September twenty twenty, let's say, this academic year. We were a little bit skeptical because we were thinking, oh my god, now who is going to come? I mean, or, and, and to apply to to this program because people cannot travel and, are free to travel. Everything is just a big question mark. And we were very, I mean, we we saw a a very huge reaction from students, from prospects students. And, this year, we had a great class. So we, the the numbers didn't change. We had, maybe the students were more motivated than in the past because they've made a big investment in this moment to, you know, to quit their job, to come and to, to follow the passion. So I think that, there was a really, a challenging year. We had, a few, I mean, few, months online and few months in presence. So we had the possibility to have the usual visits that we do, not, of course, all of them. But I see that, you know, students, even though they finish the classes now, they are continuing to go visiting companies, especially wineries in this period today. They are traveling all Italy to, you know, to keep keep up with the things they lost in this month. I wanted to give a shout out to Kathy Hoja, who's president of analytics and a mutual friend of ours, and Kathy introduced me to you. But tell us a little bit about what Kathy does and her class? Yeah. So Kathy, yes, is a great friend. Also, she introduces us. So I cannot thank her every time. I thank her lots. So Kathy started to to have a seminar, you know, at the at the school. I met her during in Italy. And, a few years ago, we were sitting together at lunch, just randomly, you know, the serendipitous meeting that you do during these events. And, we just get connected. And, and we started to to to be in touch and to, to talk. And so she for she came for a seminar. And then now she's teaching, at the school. I think that's the fourth year that she teaches. And she has a course called innovation and narration in, in the food and wine industry. So it talks about, innovation in terms of business model innovation, in terms of, product innovation and how to communicate also, you know, innovation. So, of course, now she's a, an expert, you know, big data and the use of big data in the, in this industry. And so I think that her approach, is always something that students love. And the fact also that she brings a lot of, you know, experiences from different speakers. So it's something that students really appreciate, the fact that she has a direct approach on this, on this business is something that students love. Because, you know, as you mentioned also before, we, we have a lot of dynamics in the program, but we prefer to give students also the real perspective on the business. So they come here to to learn how to work in this industry. And so it's very important that they have connections with people that work in the industry, not just study the industry. So we think that the two perspectives are complementary. So they have a lot of professors, I mean, coming from, you know, we say practitioners, but entrepreneurs, managers, professionals from the industry. Cool. And that's Kathy's company, a shout out for that is, analytics, and you can catch it online and and see, an outline of the the kind of work that she does both with Italian wineries as well as domestic US wineries. Very interesting stuff. One other teachers do you have that are visiting that are doing interesting things that you would like to highlight? So in general, our our pro our program, a part of our faculty is composed by, professionals. Is that saying. So we rely on a lot, on our business network, and it's called advisory, committee network. And this is made by leading companies, in, in the industry that participate in designing, and implementing our program. So, for example, one of this company is Beyond Disam tip, just to name one, and in the, in the one industry. We have as I was saying, so, jumpiro, Bertrini, for example, these are hosted a student for a tour of the company and, talking with them. We work, for example, with, also with Antinori, and we had, students going to the company to visit the company, with their export manager. We have, every year, we bring students to visit, Mac, Adado Capi. Company. So we have Marco introducing the company to them and, talking about segmentino. So these are just a few names, for for the wine industry. And, as for the the food companies, working with with us. We have, Granarola. We have Cop. We have Fabry. Many companies that come and teach us to our students. Which is a very famous beverage company, not just beverage, because they are very famous also in the food, but very famous for the brand, Monte and Anglo butter. They work also on, in the food, in the food industry. So these are part of the company names. In terms of our, faculty. Let's say just, academic faculty. We have professors coming from all over the world. Italian professors that live abroad and, international professors. So coming from different countries and different university. So this year, for example, we had, the opportunity to have Alek Ross, who came as a distinguished visiting professor and talking about international relations. To to our student. We have Alon Wolf who's a, a professor of engineering, and, at, technion from Israel. So very different profiles. As you see, not only in the food industry. Food and beverage industry. We have professors, coming from, NYU. We have professor coming from Yazeg. So we have very large network of, professionals and professors coming from different different universities and different, different countries. Aside from our call faculty, of course, from University of Bologna. I was particularly pleased when, one year, my I lectured there. And I I guess it was before Well, it must have been in Italy and, saw a bunch of the students have in Italy and the same thing at wine to wine, which was the business to business conference. You mentioned earlier that Stevie puts on in Verona used to be or is in November, December. And I think it might actually be live this year. So wine to wine is something to put on your calendars. But it was great to see the students there and interact with them outside the campus while you're there with a whole bunch of people from the industry, and that was, I think, very effective. Not only just for the students for networking and looking for jobs and connections and so forth, but also for the companies, that attended. So I'd like to bring this to a close, and I I I always ask this question. What, what is the big takeaway? We talked about a bunch of things. Of what we spoke about for what do you think is the most useful thing that you talked about today that our listeners might be able to take away from, this conversation? So I think that, yeah, for me, the biggest takeaway, is always when I talk about this program is always about sense making, you know, trying to understand what we did, what are we doing, trying to understand, if we are doing it right, and, what can we do best? And, In terms of what people can take away from these, I think, is the importance of, of education and continue to, you know, the vital relevance of education, even in the toughest period, and in this in in crisis moment, you know, because we, this year was really challenging for, for our students, for example, but and for companies, but I think that was very, enriching for them, and they had the best year of their lives, even though it was the pandemic. And I think that, investing in education and continue to think about what we can do best. What can we learn? How can we, you know, also learn from each other? And and, what that's one of the, the biggest thing that we try to, to push students to do, you know, to, to have these to be have this big family where they can, leverage on each other and, learn from each other. That was, ludovica Leon, who is the, director of the global MBA for Food and Wine at, Belonia Business School. Found it in ten eighty eight. I love saying that. Thank you very much for participating in today's conversation. Thank you, Steve. Thank you to, the organizers of this podcast. Thank you for listening. And, see you soon. But, yeah, it all comes back to Stevie. That's kind of the the genesis of so much that happens in Italian wines these days. So thank you, Stevie. This is Steve Ray. Thank you very much for listening to, get US market ready with Italian wine people. We'll be back next week with another edition of the show. And, big thank you to Ludovico Leon for taking time out of our schedule to share her comments with us, and we'll see you all next week. Thank you. This is Steve Ray. Thanks again for listening on behalf of the Italian wine podcast.