Two years ago, Mr. Trapani, 46, the great-grandson of Bulgari’s founder cheap links of london , commissioned a novel from the British author Fay Weldon about a woman who was jailed for trying to run over the new wife of her ex-husband. Smashing the barrier between art and commerce, the deal obliged Ms. Weldon to mention Bulgari, the Italian jeweler known for bold and very expensive gold designs, at least 12 times in a positive way links of london sweetie. The novel’s appearance coincided with the opening of a store on Sloane Street in London’s exclusive Knightsbridge section.
Later this year, Mr. Trapani hopes to strike again when he opens on a lane behind La Scala opera house in Milan the first of seven hotels bearing the Bulgari name links of london friendship. Bulgari holds 65 percent of a $150 million joint venture with Marriott International, which operates the Ritz-Carlton hotels. The 52-room hotel, in a former convent, will feature a boldly contemporary interior and a restaurant.
Bulgari, he said, seated amid $15,000 necklaces at his store along Rue Montaigne, sought “a number of elegant P.R. machines” in cities like Milan, Rome, Paris, London and New York, and possibly the Caribbean. The risk for Bulgari, he added with a laugh, “is that you poison your clients with bad spaghetti.”
Bulgari cannot afford bad pasta. After galloping growth rates of up to 32 percent annually in the late 1990’s, revenue growth slowed last year to 1 percent, though the company squeezed out a 5.8 percent increase in operating income and a net profit of 76 million euros ($85.7 million). Of its two largest competitors, Cartier, part of Richemont of Switzerland and the market leader, posted a 32 percent drop in operating income. At Tiffany & Company, the second-largest seller of fine links of london charms uk, operating profit rose, though comparable store sales dropped 1 percent.