Blumarine was bought, halved and relaunched — six years on, production is ending

Blumarine, founded in Carpi in 1977 by Anna Molinari and Gianpaolo Tarabini, was one of Italy's glamour labels — until it wasn't. By 2019 the parent Blufin was posting losses above €14 million against €33 million of consolidated turnover. In November 2019 Marco Marchi, founder of Liu Jo, took control through his holding, promising a restart and even an IPO within two years.

The restart began with cuts. In March 2020 Blumarine opened a collective dismissal procedure targeting roughly half of its 97 staff, of whom 74 sat in Carpi and 23 in Milan. Marchi called it 'a painful cut, but necessary to restart'. The IPO never came; instead the brand was folded deeper into Marchi's orbit, and in December 2023 he declared that Liu Jo had 'taken Blumarine out of anonymity'.

The arithmetic kept deteriorating. In the spring of 2025 individual exits began; on 1 January 2026 the shops and outlets branch was transferred out of Blufin into the holding Exelite. Then, reported on 18 January 2026, came the final step: Blufin will cease all production activity within months, and the roughly 20 remaining workers go onto the extraordinary wage-guarantee fund, with a voluntary-exit procedure opened.

What survives is a label and a licensing future. The company that made the clothes will not.

The buyer cut half the workforce to restart, but the problem was demand, not costs; the brand ends as a licence with nobody making it.

The acquisition bet on cutting costs into a brand whose problem was demand — halving the workforce changed the cost line, not the sales line

The promised relaunch was run as integration into the buyer's own group, so Blumarine's identity and autonomy were spent on Liu Jo's ecosystem instead

An IPO was announced within two years of the takeover; eight months later the production company is being wound down

Moving the stores to the holding first and ending production second is a wind-down sequence — the brand was being separated from everything that made it a business

Buying a faded label and halving its workforce is not a relaunch — without a demand story the cuts just finance a slower closure, and the brand ends as a licence with nobody making it.

Blufin's production ceases over 2026; about 20 employees are placed on cassa integrazione straordinaria while a voluntary-exit procedure runs. The shops and outlets already moved to Exelite on 1 January 2026. The Blumarine name continues under Marchi's control, with its future as a licensed label rather than a manufacturer.