Some journey
Over the past 50 years the Harken brothers and the family company that bears their name have become integral to every area of performance sailing. But this story is more about a colour- ful pair of engineers and an international manufacturer that is, even in 2018, more an extension of their family. Then there’s the colourful part…
Seahorse:We’ve heard on the grapevine that your 50th anniversary was quite an event… Peter Harken: Funny you should open with that, but I’m feeling a little fuzzy this morn- ing, to be honest! We had another 50th here in Italy – a bit different from the official one, it was just for the employees and their fami- lies and all their kids. And it was a really good blast, so to speak… We must’ve had 40-plus kids of all ages.
They had a lot of fun led by a bunch of Italian entertainers who kept them all fully occupied as I could tell from all the squeals, laughter and running around. This allowed all of us so-called grown-ups to do our thing
42 SEAHORSE
without being molested too much. Our Italian organising committee did a
great job of making all the employees’ families feel really special by giving them a Hollywood Oscars-style treatment with red carpet run- ways from the entrance with greeters (which I really enjoyed doing) and red carpet pathways throughout the plant for tours. Most of the families had never been through the plant and so were awestruck by all the modern machin- ery and robots that make the winches. They set up a big tent linked through the
shipping doors that had white tablecloth dinner tables with fancy silverware; waiters all dressed up in tuxedos served the whole shebang, ‘antipasto, primo, secondo, dolce’ sumptuous Italian courses coupled with lots of bianco and vino rosso. There was a stage and a big video screen that provided con- stant different types of entertainment, even a popular Luciano Pavarotti-type opera singer who was really good. All in all it was a typical classy Italian
affair with everyone dressed to the hilt – even the kids – and everyone had a terrific time with big smiles and laughter through- out the whole night. Dancing started late and went on til late or rather early morning and, yes, the bars were open all night!! SH: So Italy is firmly established, with some very talented young employees coming up… PH: Yeah. There are a lot of young families
around here combined with a lot of our technically experienced grey hairs. They know how to do things really well and with all of them there’s a bit of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci in their design and engi- neering. Always, always, no matter how simple the product like a common light switch, it has to have that Ferrari classy look. It’s the same in our Italian plant: every-
thing clean and painted with bright colours, no bare metal anywhere except raw material for manufacturing. It’s always good looking here, whether it’s their women, cars, cloth- ing, food presentation or equipment. The Italians are a passionate people with a bit of fun, mayhem and chaos so that is one of the important reasons why my brother and I wanted to set up our European operation in northern Italy, the heart of industrial excel- lence. It was certainly an interesting learning curve to combine an Anglo Saxon culture with a Mediterranean culture and make it work as well as it does now. It’s great, it’s been a hoot, and successful, we love it!! SH:And Italians love their engineering… PH: Oh yeah. They’re really good at that, very detailed and again always that great look. I call it the ‘simple line touch’. They have that inborn talent to take a plain-look- ing product like a winch handle or drum, or even a brick, and just add a simple line that gives it that extra look that grabs your eye.
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