To know more, please read the interview with Cesare Agustoni, founder and chairman of the board of directors.
Cesare Agustoni, Immobiliare Vedeggio changes its name to become Imvedo, as part of a 360-degree company’s renewal, can you tell us why?
“Times have changed and following our corporate philosophy we had to face the new requirements before us. Up to 5 years ago, Immobiliare Vedeggio didn’t have a staff of its own, although it was working excellently and was managed by other branches’ employees, part of Cesare Agustoni SA.
Instead, at present, it has an utterly completed organisational structure. So, we had to look forward, giving new generations the opportunity to manage and keep the company’s developments up to date. In this perspective, we decided our corporate reorganisation should have been based on criteria that didn’t even exist until a few years ago, to keep offering the excellent services provided up to now. A real shift in our vision”.
The company has achieved an exponential growth in the last few years. This result has been quite unexpected, considering that this business was just a branch of a company that was active in another sector. How can you explain this?
“It has been a real success. The real estate has been founded on my personal passion and interest in the brick and mortar sector, more than anything else, without a specific aim. However, as time went past, Immobiliare Vedeggio has reached an outstanding 50 thousand square meters of rental properties. This is a figure that probably only other two businesses can boast here in Ticino. As a result, from a purely “entertaining” scope, the company has moulded into an utterly completed business, that I have managed with commitment and passion. Up to a few years ago, in fact, I was in charge of everything. And this came after I had invested 100% of my time in the other company’s branches. I can certainly state that this is part of my DNA”.
This passion has forged a winning philosophy resulting in a trustworthy customer relationship.
“I would say that this is the foundation of everything. And this is what I really don’t want to lose. Our quality service, for example, doesn’t even give the time to customers to report a problem because we foresee it, also our respect for the environment and the traditional construction method have resulted in an average occupancy of our tenants being now over 15 years. This is an indicative figure. After all, we take advantage of managing mainly industrial, artisanal and commercial properties. Our private residential sector accounts for only 5% of our properties, while the remaining 95% is part of the other above-mentioned sectors”.
Let’s talk about objectives. Where are the goals to be achieved through this corporate image restructuring and renewal pointing to?
“We want to cut down by half the vacancy index, presently at 8%. It is not a critical figure, but we hope to achieve positive results already starting from 2020. Thanks to the new governance, supported by the newly hired commercial resources, we intend to plan new marketing and advertising campaigns. We leap into the future retaining our traditions and quality. This exceptional care for details has resulted, in more than one occasion, in becoming the reference for international customers settled in Ticino, and these clients chose us among many for this very reason. Evidence of this is our way of growing and investing. We grow with clear and defined objectives, taking some occasional risks, but this is inevitable when investing. However, just to be clear, we never “bite off more than what we can chew”. Basically, these are my personal principles that I’ve tried to transfer to everybody, and I would like them to be kept. It will be the new generation’s challenge to enhance them in a new and modern key.”
What is, in a nutshell, your philosophy to success?
“It’s a matter of character, circumstances you’re embedded in. You need to be calm, feel integrated. It’s essential to be surrounded by a competitive and winning team, and this is achieved by respecting workers. That’s all. We’ve transformed passion into objectives, bringing tangible results”.
By Filippo Rossi