Who does not remember the legendary Brooklyn chewing gum, ‘la gomma del ponte’, with the “long-lasting taste”? However, probably not everyone knows that the chewing gum named after the famous New York bridge is very Italian. Its roots go back to 1946 in Lainate (Milan) when brothers Ambrogio and Egidio Perfetti founded the “Dolcificio Lombardo for the production of candies and pastilles.” Ten years later, in 1956, they launched Brooklyn chewing gum.
From Mexico to the U.S., to the rest of the world
But let’s take a step back – actually, two steps back. In Italy, chewing gums arrived in the immediate postwar period, brought by American soldiers who chewed them constantly to mitigate wartime stress. And in the world? The “blame” lies in an unlikely partnership between a Mexican general and an American trader.
In the 1870s, General Antonio Lòpez de Santa Ana (a protagonist of the Battle of the Alamo in 1836), while serving a period of exile, thought to get rich by proposing, as an alternative to rubber, latex from chicle, a plant widespread in Mexico. The substance, however, presented some difficulty in vulcanizing. So Santa Ana sold all his stock to a New York merchant, Thomas Adams, who until then had not enjoyed particular good fortune. Taking cues from the customs of many Central American peoples, Adams created a product exclusively for chewing, founding the Adams New York Chewing Gum. From then on, the product became increasingly popular, thanks partly to a series of refinements that gave it the different flavours we are all familiar with.
A (successful) product that is more than a product
Back in Italy, after the Brooklyn chewing gum, it was the turn of the very famous Big Babol, launched in 1978. This chewing gum immediately became a huge success, especially among the younger generation. It soon became a generational symbol, capable in its small way of marking the distance between fathers and sons.
Big Babol’s success was soon followed by that of other chewing gum and candy brands: Morositas, Vigorsol, Happydent, Vivident, and Alpenliebe.
While in the 1970s, chewing gum was often seen as dismissive and not particularly refined behaviour, in the 1980s, the introduction of functional chewing gum that does not stick to teeth and sugar-free chewing gum highlighted the strengths of this “non-food,” including its ability to relieve stress.
Acquisitions and expansions: continued growth
In the meantime, the company grew through a series of significant acquisitions. The first, in 1986, was Caremoli, a company also based in Lainate and producing the very famous Golia. The following year, it was the turn of Gelco, which made the Goleador. At the beginning of the 1990s, Perfetti opened new production units in Turkey, India, China, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Brazil. In 1996, Daygum was launched. Its oral sanitizing properties ultimately paved the way for chewing gum use.
But Perfetti’s momentum did not stop. In 2001, the Perfetti S.p.A. Group acquired the Dutch company Van Melle N.V., with its famous Mentos and Fruittella brands. Thus, in 2001, the Perfetti Van Melle Group was established, which acquired Chupa Chups in 2006 and continued to launch new brands and products.
In 2023, acquiring Trident, Dentyne, and Bubbaloo brands from Mondelēz International increased the company’s sales from €3 billion to €4 billion.
Today, about nine million households in Italy chew chewing gum, and Perfetti is the third largest producer of confectionery and sweets in the world after Mondelēz International and Mars. It has nearly 20,000 employees, 36 companies and 31 production plants and sells its products in 150 countries worldwide.
Congratulations to those who take Italian chewing gum all over the world!
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