Today we had the worst weather yet. It was just under 50 degrees and raining. Even worse it was still windy so it felt even colder than it was. Regardless of the weather, we had a company meeting planned and we had to continue on. 

Today we met again with the people from the fashion consortium except this time we also met the president of the consortium. They gave us a 30 minute breakdown of how their new company within the consortium operates and also how the entire consortium functions. Throughout the presentation, the speakers stressed the phrase “made in Italy” and this was one of the big reasons for founding the consortium. They also gave us a specific details about the characteristics of the consortium such as that 55% of the companies are comprised of 6-55 employees. Also each company does about 5-20€ Million in revenue each year. I thought it was really cool the people from the consortium gave us such detailed facts about their business. 

After the brief lecture, the president of the consortium answered our questions in a q&a session. One interesting topic that came up was when the president said that he and other Italian consortiums aren’t worried about companies stealing other company’s technology. He said in the fashion industry, everyone copies everyone all the time. It simply isn’t an issue that is important in the fashion industry unlike in engineering because there isn’t a lot of proprietary technology.

After we finished our business meeting, my friends and I ate at a sushi place. I had a tuna roll and it was great because it was the most balanced meal I’ve had on this trip in terms of eating the proper amount of protein, carbohydrates, and fat. It felt great to eat something other than pasta and pizza.