The Italian luxury yacht builder Benetti celebrates its 140th Birthday.
The company was established back in 1873 by Lorenzo Benetti, originally the stock product was wooden boats predominantly used for trading. After the passing of Lorenzo, his sons Gini and Emilio took over management of the company changing the name to Fratelli Benetti, rapidly building a strong reputation for quality and craftsmanship around the Mediterranean region and beyond.
After the onset of WWII, the market for commercial wooden sailing vessels shrank, to remain competitive the company needed to change direction and this became the catalyst for the company’s move into the steel based pleasure craft market. the 1960s witnessed the first of the company’s luxury mega yachts built within its only boatyard. Since 1980 the fleet has included big motor yachts in the 30 to 60 meter range and beyond, not least the famous 86-meter ‘Nabila’.
In 1985 the boatyard was bought by another of Italy’s great Yacht Company’s, Turin based Azimut Yachts. With new management, Benetti made a further leap forward into the modern world of luxury boat building that we know today. Although improvements were introduced in both the management structure and technological innovations via pooled experience, the boatyard still retained its traditional values, skills and passion for fine craftsmanship.
For Benetti, building luxury yachts means carrying on the tradition of innovation, style and quality that has shaped the company’s approach and culture, continuing to diversify production in order to satisfy the increasingly complex needs expressed by Owners throughout the world. After abandoning wood and being the first to realise the potential of composite materials for the production of mega yachts, as early as the 1960s it made the transition from metal boats to the steel and aluminium.
Today Benetti utilizes these materials, alone or combined, to design and build full-custom displacement and semi-displacement motor yachts in a broad variety of lengths from 93 feet to 90+ meters. These truly tailor made vessels embody the Owner’s idea of what a yacht should be, while retaining the Benetti family-feeling that is a natural expression of the finest Italian style and timeless elegance. This production capacity, united with world class quality, fanatical attention to detail and a perfect end result, have made Benetti a world leader and an Italian luxury yacht icon.
Over the years the shipyard has grown and changed, not following but anticipating the times. Once the Fratelli Benetti boatyard was famous for building three-masted wooden schooners for commercial use. Today Benetti motor yachts turn heads at the world’s most famous and exclusive ports of call. Stylish, exclusive and extremely well-crafted, Benetti yachts are well established at the height of Italian Excellence.
“This year will not only be the 140th anniversary of Benetti, it will be also the 10th anniversary of the acquisition of the Livorno Shipyard bought from the Orlando family. We plan a dense calendar of events culminating next June in Portofino with a very exclusive week-end together with our clients from all over the world. Owners that does not come to us to buy a ready made yacht, but to construct one together with us in order to fully express their personality and live a genuine rapport with the sea. Clients who approach us with ideas and expectations that are a challenge and a continuous stimulus and when we meet their brief and make every detail perfect with no concessions to compromise, their success becomes ours. This level of quality and passion are the only route to our next 140 years of success”. – commented Ing Vincenzo Poerio – Benetti’s Ceo.
140 years of spectacular history has resulted in close to 300 boats being built, over 300,000 sq mt of production facilities at six shipyards in Italy (Viareggio, Livorno and Fano), 34 yachts under construction at this present time including a 300 feet mega yacht. These facts and figures demonstrate the momentum of Benetti’s growth and Clients’ unrestrained confidence in the brand.
It is a success story confirmed by the last “Global Order Book” that awarded Azimut / Benetti Group as the “largest builder in the world for custom yachts over 24 meters” for an incredible 13 consecutive years.
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