In spring 2018, a documentary by the Swiss television about the development and decline of the Omegna Houseware District will be aired. The production of steel household articles in Italy is concentrated in two districts, which occupy more than 60% of the national production: Lumezzane (BS) and Omegna, whose reputation was known even abroad, due to the presence of leading companies and quality and niche products. In the 1960s, Cusian households was the leader in Europe, together with Sheffield in England and Solingen in Germany, with names such as Alessi, Bialetti, Girmi, Irmel, Piazza, Calderoni and Lagostina, who dominated the market for years. All family-run businesses, concentrated in a well-defined area, with great innovative capacity, which, in addition to renewing their manufacturing techniques, focused on qualified and design products. Then, in the 1990s, globalization and the emergence of new low-priced global competitors found unprepared the companies of Verbano-Cusio-Ossola and they started to decline. To this we need to add the saturation of consumption, paradoxically due to the high quality of the products, because whoever bought an Alessi tray, a Bialetti moka pot or a pot of Lagostina kept it forever, never consumed it. Engineer Giuseppe Nerozzi, interviewed as a witness to the District’s ascent years and then to the crisis, having been in the household sector since 1962, gives a positive sign: there are those who continue to believe in the territory, like him, who remained in the District and founded a company, GALNER, specialized in supplying customized coffee makers, keeping the product design within the local area.
