The arrival to the Mexican market
“There were very few of us, so we only sold imported products. In 1993 I took over the marketing department and what shaped my training as a leader was a phrase that Mr. Michele Ferrero constantly said: quality is the purest form of respect for the consumer. Also knowing that, although we sell very good products, companies are made of people”, he narrates.
Little by little the company was gaining ground in Mexico. Its workforce grew to more than 2,200 employees and today it owns 27.7% of the value of the chocolate market in the country. Cornero attributes this growth to the fact that the family has always sought to develop products that are difficult to imitate and of extreme quality, such as Ferrero Rocher, the Kindergarten line, and Nutella.
Also because the relatives who operated the business understood very early that to guarantee its continuity they had to be institutionalized. It was never a question of losing the roots, but of betting on processes, innovation, discipline and talent that felt part of the family.
“Staying in the regions of Europe would have been a sentence. Today we are a company that also produces in Mexico, exports to North and South America, and that has a very clear DNA, but with a turnover of 12,000 million euros worldwide”, he mentions.
In Mexico, three out of ten family businesses survive the change of the first generation, but only one manages to reach the third line of direct descent, according to the firm Asesores de Consejo y Alta Dirección (ACAD). This is due to the fact that, due to the family configuration that characterizes them, they tend to be little focused on optimal management of their administrative processes and biased towards a lack of openness in attracting external leaders.
Óscar Fonseca, director of the Mexico City Campus Business School, says that in the world of family businesses there are two types of vision: the traditional entrepreneur who clings to his formula and continues to operate his company, and the leader who knows that to continue growing, it has to let go of the ship’s rudder.
Although family businesses are more likely to create a patriarchal organizational culture, Grupo Ferrero opted to mediate the concept of family business and institutionalized company. In other words, it was not limited to direct family members being in charge of the company’s operation.
In fact, the next work adventure for Cornero was in Brazil. He was appointed CEO of Ferrero and believed that this Latin country was the island of fantasy, however, he had to wake up. The Brazilians faced the devaluation of the real (3.99 Mexican pesos), and the Italian managed to lift the company, despite the economic context.
It was nine years of continuous work in which Cornero reaffirmed that intelligence is not enough on its own if it is not combined with curiosity and the desire to discover and go deeper. “This is how you start to draw possible scenarios, with other people’s points of view that can help you envision solutions.”
“Obviously it is easier to sell chocolate than it is to sell nails. However, when you have great products you also have a lot of competition that looks at you and wants to bring you down because it is part of the market game. But if we manage to combine intelligence with curiosity and not be afraid of mistakes, we will always go one step ahead”, she points out.
After reinventing the company in Brazil, Cornero replicated the formula in Argentina and in 2010 he was offered the presidency and general management of Mexico, Central America and part of the Caribbean. His first action was to present to the Ferreros the potential that the company had on Mexican soil and a factory was built with an initial investment of 200 million euros.
In Mexico, the company is about to celebrate its 30th anniversary, while Cornero celebrates its 40th anniversary in the chocolate group. Ferrero Mexico, in addition, had a growth of 15.9% versus the previous year, with total sales of 404 million euros.
The CEO is sure that the consolidation of the company responds to the human sense that characterizes it. “We could have planted the first seed on this land, but if we hadn’t had the workers we have and who immediately bought into the idea of being part of this family, it wouldn’t have been possible,” he says.