MakerBot may have been the first, iMakr may be the one with the largest stores, but no one else today can boast as many 3D printing stores with the same brand as 3DiTALY, Italy’s first 3D print shop and Europe’s first 3D printing retail franchise. This weekend (June 28th), 3DiTALY will open its fifth shop, in Turin.
The chain, co-founded by Antonio Alliva, is set up as a “social franchise”, where new members pay a fee to use the brand and get set up with supplier contacts and training, then they become part of a non-hierarchical network where every shop is on the same level and can equally share responsibilities and growth.
The business model is working. After opening the very first shop in Rome in 2013, during the first six months of 2014, 3DiTALY has already opened four more shops all over the Italian peninsula. After Pescara – in central Italy – they went to Ragusa, in Sicily, and then back up north to Milan, Italy’s business capital. Now it is time for Turin, the home of FIAT and the largest city closest to the birthplace of Arduino (both the board and the nobleman from the Middle Ages).
Every time they open up a new store, the 3DiTALY team organizes activities to show the potential of 3D printing in relation to a long standing tradition form the city that hosts it. For example in Ragusa they used WASP’s 3D printer to make 3D sculptures out of traditional Modica chocolate, in Milan they ran around with tricycles carrying a ShareBot NG 3D Printer to show everyone that they could create anything they could imagine.
In Turin, 3DiTALY will try to connect one of the city’s historical landmarks — the “torét” (turret) — Turin’s famous fountain that all locals hold very dear — to a modern day icon such as the Ardunio board, which Massimo Banzi programmed just a few kilometers away, in Ivrea. This time the creative project will involve a 3D printed structure that will cover up the fountain’s exterior while letting the water flow through the Arduino board, to the people’s affection.
For 3DiTALY this will be the first in a series of tests using 3D printing technologies in the field of urban decoration, implementing sustainability and social participation to improve the efficiency and the effectiveness of urban systems and devices. The trio of young entrepreneurs, that less than a year ago opened up their very first shop, has definitely come a long way in a short time and their success is representative of a change that — hopefully — is going on throughout the entire country.
Italy has long been the home of great artisans, food and football. Food is untouchable but for the last half a century football has been growing bigger while traditional artistic creativity and crafts have seemingly been gradually abandoned. It seems the tide is turning: Italian football is definitely on a downward slope lately, while creativity — led by 3D Design and 3D printing technologies — has been booming at levels not seen since the Reinassance. The two now can co-exist and, even for a huge club football fan such as myself, it is a welcome change.
