For thirty years I have worked on one question: what makes a product truly luxury, and when does a brand stop deserving the word.
I have approached it from three positions.
As a consultant and manager. I started in 1976, as a consultant and Managing Director of a consulting firm with offices in Milan, Padua and London. I have worked with companies such as LVMH, Prada, Richemont, B&B Italia, Driade and Poliform. Today I work with Finstral.
As a teacher. At SDA Bocconi since 1993, now as an SDA Fellow, and for more than twenty years at Bocconi University and IULM. I have also taught at the Catholic University of Milan and at Aalto University in Helsinki. Since 2003 I have taught at Richemont’s Creative Academy.
As an entrepreneur, for almost twenty years in the restaurant business, where I learned what a promise of quality really costs.
My thesis is simple, and I have held it since 2002, from a paper with Giovanni Comboni on prestige goods companies: luxury is born from the product. The brand amplifies it, the customer recognises it. When a brand sells meaning without keeping the substance, luxury empties out. When it chases the market, it ends up competing on price.
Today I try to measure this gap with the AGG method (anchor, grid, gradient). I present it in a paper under review at an international journal; a preprint is on SSRN. The method has limits, and I state them. Alongside the method there are data: a survey of people working in luxury on product quality, seen from the inside: 190 responses collected, 108 used after narrowing the criteria for luxury brands.
I sit on the scientific committee of the Fondazione Cologni dei Mestieri d’Arte.
I work with high-end manufacturers that want to become brands, and with investors who want to understand what really supports the price of a luxury business. I also work with institutions, on scientific committees and in management education.
Contact: antoniocatalani.ac@gmail.com
Teaching
SDA Bocconi School of Management: Senior Professor from 1993 to 2009, SDA Fellow since 2010.
Bocconi University, 1998 to 2025: Management of Design, Design Lab, Creativity and Management.
IULM University, Milan, 2001 to 2025: brand strategy for design-intensive companies.
Università Cattolica, Milan, 2010 to 2025: Luxury Business Insights, an international course on luxury.
Aalto University, Helsinki, 2013 and 2014: Luxury Management, Visiting Professor.
Creative Academy (Richemont group), Milan, since its founding in 2003: luxury management for designers and future luxury managers.
Consulting and business
Independent advisor since 1976 on brand positioning, product strategy, distribution and international growth, for companies in fashion, jewellery, watches, design and retail, including LVMH, Prada, Versace, Richemont, Luxottica, B&B Italia, Driade and Poliform.
Until 1993, CEO of a marketing consultancy with offices in Milan, Padua and London.
From 2001 to 2019, partner in a restaurant holding company in Milan, with 14 outlets including Fatto Bene Burger. That is where I learned what a promise of quality really costs.
Institutions
Member of the Scientific Committee of Fondazione Cologni dei Mestieri d’Arte, Milan, since 2019.
Selected publications
No Product No Brand: An Operational Definition of Luxury. SSRN, 2026.
Il lusso alla ricerca di un’identità (Luxury in search of an identity), with L. Carcano. Economia & Management, 2007.
Miti da sfatare nel gioiello (Myths to debunk in jewellery), with L. Carcano and P. Varacca Capello. Egea, 2007.
Il gioiello italiano ad una svolta (Italian jewellery at a turning point), with L. Carcano and P. Varacca Capello. FrancoAngeli, 2005.
A Traditional Management Model in the Prestige Goods Industry, with G. Comboni. SDA Bocconi Working Paper, 2002.
Il curriculum per convincere. Bompiani, 1998.
De Publicitate, with a critical preface by Umberto Eco. Line, December 1979.
Education
Degree in Engineering, University of Bologna, 1974.
Two-year course in Aesthetics, Università Internazionale dell’Arte, Florence, 1977 and 1978.
Contact
antoniocatalani.ac@gmail.com · linkedin.com/in/antoniocatalani
