Barga business closes doors after 52 years

An emotional moment for Gino Popolani this morning as he put up a sign in his shop window telling his friends and customers that after 52 years of selling, installing and repairing radio TV and electrical goods in Barga that he has had to give in to stronger forces and at the end of the year he will be shutting the door and pulling down the blind for the last time.

Gino has been in business since 1956 and after more than half a century he now wants to relax a bit, devote more time to his family,  and probably indulge himself in his other passion - photography.

[Click here for slideshow]

What a different world it was when he first started the business. Television was unheard of and radio was blazing the trail for the mass media. Gino remembers delivering radio sets to outlying villages around Barga by mule as there were no roads. His first independent means of transport for the business was a motorbike. This meant using the taxi service to deliver bulky items to his customers As his company progressed he bought his first van making deliveries of the newfangled washing machines, gas cookers and fridges a far easier proposition.

He still has in his shop the first television ever installed in Barga - a well preserved valve based set with a tiny black and white screen that was installed in the far end of a bar room inside Barga Vecchia (actually inside what is now the Altana restaurant) watching television in those days was a public event as private ownership of a television set was still a long way off for most people.

A good part of his business was based around electrical repairs and as the digital revolution arrived at the start of the 90s and gradually picked up speed towards the end of the century it gave less and less opportunity to make those repairs as quite often it was just easier to throw the broken object away and buy another.

The techniques and equipment that Gino has acquired and used over the years had become less and less relevant to chip based technology used in most modern electrical goods.

Even the system of building up a stock of goods to sell to the public had changed dramatically with the advent of the hypermarkets which these days appear to advertise and sell the goods without even having them in stock. Bringing them in only once the demand is there.

How far are we away from the next step which is only manufacturing them once the demand is there?

Click on the link below to hear Gino talking about his 52 years in business (in Italiano)

 

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4 Responses to “Barga business closes doors after 52 years”

Comments

1. mato Nov 21 2008 / 12pm

   Complimenti per l’articolo: una storia che fa pensare.
   Specialmente in questi tempi in cui da una parte è evidente l’impossibilità di andare avanti seguendo l’attuale modello di sviluppo (a forza di consumare stiamo consumando il pianeta ed i suoi abitanti), dall’altra ci sentiamo ripetere ossessivamente che l’unica ricetta possibile è quella di rilanciare i consumi.
   Molto stimolante la conclusione: “How far are we away from the next step which is only manufacturing them once the demand is there?”
   A quel punto, diventerebbe inevitabile ripensare radicalmente le modalità del lavoro, dato che verrebbe spazzato via l’attuale modello di produzione a ciclo continuo. Sarebbe necessario un salto di qualità nella progettualità di intellettuali, classe imprenditoriale e rappresentanza politica. Anzi, avrebbe già dovuto esserci per far fronte ai rapidissimi mutamenti degli ultimi anni, alcuni dei quali evidenziati nell’articolo. Secondo voi c’è stato?
2. jjcarde Nov 21 2008 / 6pm

   di sicuro era l’unico che ti faceva i cavi su misura
3. rhazckal Nov 24 2008 / 10am

   Era uno dei pochi che invece di mandarti da cento responsabili e farti fare cento viaggi ti faceva il lavoro.

Blog posts on this article

1. Life as it was - exhibition by Moreno Tognelli at barganews Dec 10 2008 / 11am

   [...] life from the recent past. The closing of Gino Popolani ’s business last month (article here) which had been a part of the Barga landscape for more than 50 years has now meant that his [...]

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