VIETRI Nationwide Celebration Saturday November 7, 2009

Over 200 top specialty stores across America are having a Festa VIETRI event on Saturday, November 7, 2009 to celebrate the award-winning wholesaler of handcrafted Italian products. VIETRI has provided national ads, email blasts and postcards mailed to stores’ customers, plus extensive web, blog, YouTube, and Twitter marketing. Festa VIETRI stores are featured on VIETRI’s web site. Plus, VIETRI has provided posters, Italian recipes, gifts-with-purchase and a special Italian gift, signed by VIETRI founders, for a lucky winner at each store on November 7, 2009.

“Our VIETRI collectors will see new holiday and gift collections and celebrate with other fans all over the country,“ said Lauren Teal of My Favorite Things in Tallahassee, Florida. “VIETRI events are always a success for us,“ she added.

“I’ve loved the online and social marketing of Festa VIETRI,“ said Carey Pearlman of Salutations Home in Pasadena, California. “We expect new customers as well as regulars so I’m planning an Italian feast of displays and foods,“ added Pearlman, a VIETRI traveler to Italy in 2008 on the Sea Cloud.

VIETRI founders, Susan and Frances Gravely, shared four favorite Italian recipes which are printed on Festa VIETRI cards for all shoppers in stores across the country on November 7, 2009. “We personally invited our customers and consumers, signed every special give-away for each Festa VIETRI store and are going to be at top stores in North Carolina and Colorado on the big day,“ said Frances Gravely. “It’s an Italian party for VIETRI friends and family in wonderful stores! We’re thrilled with the participation this first year.“

Festa VIETRI is the fourth prong of VIETRI’s program to help stores increase sales in this challenging economic year. VIETRI’s Event Program has supported store events throughout 2009, with company founders, executives and Italian artisans, visiting hundreds of stores. Festa VIETRI, a one-day VIETRI celebration in stores across America and Canada on November 7, 2009 with extraordinary support from the family-owned import company, may be the most exciting for passionate fans and stores.

“As America’s largest importer of handcrafted Italian tabletop, home and garden products to beautiful stores, we’ve got a lot to celebrate at Festa VIETRI,“ said founder Gravely.

Cara Fratto
VIETRI Marketing Director

Visit to Domain in Forth Worth, TX

Owners of Domain, Mark Vaughan and Tad Watts, and VIETRI Founder Frances Gravely have reason to be happy. Domain has expanded in a new space that has 20' ceilings and a grandeur that matches Domain's great style. I enjoyed a fabulous day with VIETRI collectors and fans at Domain in Ft. Worth on October 22nd, signing pieces and sharing stories of Italian vacations, studies, adventures and the amazing master artisans who create VIETRI's pieces. I loved Ft. Worth with its relatively lush environment, a wonderful sense of history and community and great people.

These four young professionals - Cathy Pappas, Eunice McColm, Claudia Hutchinson and Claudia Butts - had a ball discussing every VIETRI display at Domain, catching up with each other, laughing and finally selecting their favorites over a period of at least an hour. It was fun to watch and hear them - such vitality and joy. They're examples of how attractive folks are in Texas. I already look forward to returning to the Lone Star state!


This mother and daughter picked out their Old St. Nick platter together and were very intent as they decided which Italian sayings they'd like written on their family treasure. What joy it is to be part of this experience for a mother and daughter!

Frances Gravely

VIETRI Founder

Margo's Founder's Event

I was in Tulsa, Oklahoma at Margo's on October 23rd and thought I was in Santa's workshop!! Never have I seen such magical holiday displays of VIETRI! The Italian buffet - all made by different Margo's staff - was amazing too.

Some of Margo's shoppers had me sign over 20 different VIETRI pieces as Christmas Gifts. Ah, to have that much holiday shopping FINISHED! (I was in heaven.) I already miss my comfortable, grounded, contented new friends of Oklahoma and Texas. I bet they're the same in Colorado where I'll be next week. Edwards, Breenwood Village, Boulder and Parker, here I come! Hope to see some of you there.

Frances Gravely
VIETRI Founder

Cozy Family Dinners!

Fall is here and I couldn’t be more excited! The air is getting chilly, the leaves will soon start to change…turtlenecks, scarves, rosy cheeks, and most importantly…COZY family dinners!

The majority of my favorite memories consist of these dinners. I don’t remember what food was served or that we were even celebrating anything in particular. I don’t even remember exactly what the dinner conversation was…I just remember the feeling. The feeling that everyone you love and care about is exactly where they are supposed to be…together.

I remember the smell of freshly lit candles reflecting in sparkling glasses, polished silver, and colorful linens. I remember looking out the window on a chilly evening while we were warm by the fire, my mom shrieking and covering our eyes when my Dad popped the champagne. I remember the way my Mom’s eyes sparkled in the candlelight when she looked at my Dad, and I remember my Dad sitting at the head of the table, proudly smiling has he watched his beautiful family (even when my sisters and I got the bright idea to stick breadsticks up our noses)…together, happy, laughing, and having fun.

As I look back on my life, these are the memories and moments I cherish the most. These are the moments that I will continue as I start a family. Celebrations that are special, but also relaxing and fun. Basically…VIETRI in a nut shell.

This is the time, more than ever, to get together with friends and family…laugh, talk and create memories with the people you love!

Lizzy Fisher

VIETRI at Fearrington Store Manager

VIETRI Villa Abbellimento in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin

Today there is a brunch at the hip Italian restaurant next door to Abbellimento, followed by my signing purchases and greeting guests during the day in the store. Once again, I’m smitten by the beautiful and natural people of the Midwest. I want to return here for a vacation with my whole family.

At the delicious Italian brunch is a young couple who have driven for almost two hours to arrive at 9 a.m. in Lake Geneva. He had visited Milan about seven times as a model of haute couture. She could have been a model herself. Their love for each other is inspiring as we gather after my talk on Italian style and entertaining.

Kathy Francke has clearly won the loyalty of Lake Geneva customers in just one year. The three events are filled with VIETRI and Abbellimento devotees, including a wonderful collection of devoted family and friends. Even a bird flew into the store bringing good luck and excitement to our Saturday!

A favorite customer is an Italian lady who quoted her “Nona” –grandmother – with sweet reminders about how to live beautifully. “I am so proud to own beautiful VIETRI,” she would say, as she asked me to sign special pieces for her.

It’s always a particular thrill for me when store staff asks me to sign their VIETRI purchases at the end of my visit. I love to write expressions in Italian that match the particular individuals. It was hard to tear myself away from writing to my new Abbellimento friends in order to make my 5:50 p.m. flight from Milwaukee back to North Carolina on this Saturday.

I recommend that you readers consider a driving trip to the lakes of Wisconsin and Michigan, staying at waterside Inns and B&B’s between visits to charming villages. I can’t wait to return.

If you decide to fly there first, take a jacket and small blanket for the flight. Airlines are not heating the planes like they used to, perhaps to save on energy costs. I ended up buying a blanket for $5 and dreaming of the warmth of Midwesterners. I count our VIETRI blessings for these customers and colleagues.

Grazie mille, amicie di Michigan e Wisconsin, e tutti del mondo!

Frances Gravely
VIETRI Founder

Lake Geneva & Abbellimento, our newest VIETRI Villa

I said one last goodbye to my view of the wide Mississippi River and four receding bluffs as I left my hotel and La Crosse for a drive with Markus to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. En route we stopped by The Givin’ House in Madison to admire a two-year-old store that sells VIETRI and other accessory pieces with furniture. Owner Paula and her husband, Bart who works nearby and was there for his daily visit with his wife, were a handsome duo whose good taste and enthusiasm are key to their success.

On we drove to Lake Geneva, the Newport of Wisconsin. Corporate giants of Chicago built their mansions on Lake Geneva in the early 20^th century and so have followed more two-home-plus families for their summers near the gorgeous lake. The Wrigley Mansion, seen on Lake Geneva from down town, looks like a miniature Metropolitan Museum.

The town is another “English village” with hanging baskets and planters of mixed flowers at every turn. My destination in Lake Geneva is Abbellimento, opened only a year ago by a special young woman, Kathy Francke, who was a VIETRI sales representative before opening her dream store. Kathy sold VIETRI to all our stores in Wisconsin. One day, while visiting our customer in Lake Geneva, she learned that the owner was ready to close her store and join her retired husband in a constant vacation. Kathy took the plunge, restoring an antique store right on the main street, and having Italian artisans to demonstrate their crafts on Abbellimento’s first day open.

Her jewel box of a store is filled with VIETRI and I was there to formally celebrate the Grand Opening of Abbellimento’s Villa VIETRI status. We are having a private cocktail party in the store this Friday night for invited guests.

The two windows and front half of Abbellimento are full of VIETRI. Are we in Italy?

Italian music lilts over the sparkling shelves of Murano Perl Glass and every dinnerware collection VIETRI carries, gorgeous planters and urns, handpainted wall plates and platters, and colorfully handled flatware mixing with each place setting sprinkled throughout the store. I am thrilled with Kathy’s great taste! She has extraordinary friends as well.

A favorite guest of the evening is the willowy, graceful lady who had retired from her former VIETRI store and who was clearly so very pleased with Abbellimento and Kathy Francke. I detected her motherly pride to see her own store’s spirit continuing.

Frances Gravely
VIETRI Founder

Touch of Class

Touch of Class matches its name. Set in a thriving flower-bedecked downtown of 19^th century and Victorian brick buildings, the store is in two long, narrow buildings open to each other inside. The first room has the best casual-yet-sophisticated clothes I’ve ever seen in one store – Eileen Fisher and other names sought from all over Wisconsin, plus shawls, bags and accessories with flare. VIETRI shines from the second room, plus a glass counter of jewelry that draws a stream of collectors as well. Owner Kim’s best friend, Diane, is her manager. This pair has organizational and management skills that match their dedication to customers. Their staff beam with fun, passion and professionalism. What a team!

Owner Kim Pretakki and I had enjoyed espresso together earlier this morning at a local café with a lively exchange of business ideas. An Italian brunch started our day in Café Via’s outdoor terrace next door. I was the stand-up entertainment sharing secrets about VIETRI’s beginnings in Italy, how Italians entertain at home and the ways that VIETRI’s Italian artisans know fashion trends before they’re even seen on the haute couture runways of Milan, Rome and Florence. The afternoon signing and dining continued in the store, undampened by occasional showers. Attractive customers steadily filled the store buying almost every Bellezza and Old Saint Nick accessory, with Incanto, planters and colorfully painted ceramics, like Botanico, also selling well. Touch of Class had just received our embossed Bellezza Dinnerware two days before the event – and I was thrilled to see it fly out of the store. A couple came in with a desire to treat themselves to new dinnerware after becoming bored with their wedding pattern of 10 years. Bellezza won their hearts so they purchased a large platter and took several Bellezza brochures to distribute to their family members with requests that their future Christmas and birthday presents be this new dinnerware. Smart!

I especially loved putting Italian Christmas wishes and wedding expressions on lots of VIETRI purchases. Fortunately, I was so engaged at my signing table that I didn’t have time to graze at the delicious spread of food set on coordinating platters on the other side of the store. Our tall Territory Manager, Markus Schwartz, had brought divine Italian cookies to Touch of Class from Milwaukee.

The day ended buoyantly over dinner with owner Kim, manager Diane, their husbands and my VIETRI sidekick, Markus. The husbands have worked together in several businesses and their wives run Touch of Class. It warmed my heart to see how proud the men were of their wives as they all shared tales of renovating the Victorian-era store that houses Touch of Class with its 14’ decorated ceilings, deep dental molding and antique light fixtures mixing. I love the outdoorsy, can-do, robust spirit of Wisconsin people. The land is just as beautiful with lots of lakes and rivers. I plan to stay longer the next time so I can visit our VIETRI stores in this area.

Frances Gravely
VIETRI Founder

Wisconsin

I’ve always thought staying at a hotel near the airport would be a drag. It’s incredibly easy and one is not even aware you’re at the airport!

I slept late thanks to my 3-minute delivery to the Detroit airport to catch a 10:20 plane to La Crosse, Wisconsin. As I checked in, I asked the name of the architect of the sparkling modern airport. “We wish we knew” exclaimed two ladies behind the desk, “because he didn’t know a thing about airports!” As I cocked my head with interest, they enthusiastically listed shadeless windows to the South that caused blindness for an hour each day, no rollers to help move suitcases from the scales to the rolling track behind their desks, and several other flaws. We agreed that the architect had failed to consult their practical wisdom, and then off I went to my gate.

La Crosse, Wisconsin is a natural beauty. The small airport is on an island surrounded by the Mississippi and the Black rivers. Evergreen trees are lush and the Minnesota hills are beyond. Most of the houses en route to town have boats in their driveways on this drizzly Wednesday morning. Even my Radisson Hotel room overlooks the mighty Mississippi River with verdant parks on either side of it. I’ve always wanted to live on a body of water, so my dream has come true today as I’m here to catch up with computer work before tomorrow’s event with Touch of Class, just two blocks away. Rain splashes on and off all afternoon so I’m prevented from walking up to meet owner Kim Pretakki and her staff as I’d like. Luckily, the restaurant downstairs is divine and warmed by the local accent of a friendly waitress. My salmon over wilted spinach and wild rice with minced hazelnuts and mushrooms might as well be along the Champs Elyse, so I eat slowly, slowly, to delay the meal’s end for as long as possible. The maple-syrup butter on dark bread is my dessert. With a long gaze at the wide Mississippi flowing past my window in the lamp lights’ reflection beyond the park, I head to bed feeling like I’ve had a spa day midst the Wisconsin and Minnesota hills in the Mississippi River valley. The fountain splashes outside my window and I think I hear the river flowing with the rustling breezes through the open windows. I’m looking forward to being in Touch of Class tomorrow.

Frances Gravely
VIETRI Founder