After three years of professional experience in Mumbai, Chiara Redaelli and Francesco Cappoli decided to start their own project that puts the human being at the center of the tourist experience and not the “hit and run” logic. And today her team has more than twenty people
“Our greatest passion is travel. Ever since we were very young, we have always used every savings we had for departures and discoveries.” Clear And Francis They have been life partners since school: she has a degree in Law, he in economics. In between they traveled around the world IndiaMiddle East, Thailand, Cambodia. After three years of professional experience a Bombayfor Francesco in the field of consulting and for Clear as a legal adviser, she decided to go there again Italyin her hometown, a Leccoto start a startup.
Klara Redaelli, born in 1992, defines herself as a “chronic generator of ideas”. After completing her law studies, she began working in public administration at the Italian consulate To Bombay. Francesco Capopolis he is 31 years old and a “problem solver” by nature: double degree in management, his career follows strategic consulting. “My job grew out of the ability to solve other people’s problems as quickly as possible. Until I decided to make those problems my own,” he smiles.
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“Away from Vietnam, too much pollution. Italy has more strengths than weaknesses and we want to strengthen it with our work.”
The idea of starting a startup from scratch, in Italycomes at a precise moment, during a journey to Florence. “We wanted to enjoy it without the chaos of the city. Map in hand, a gentleman revealed to us a small shrine upstairs Piazzale Michelangelo Franz remembers. As a good Florentine architect, he thought well of not only showing us but accompanying us there and telling us about this other and fascinating face of Florence. At that moment, the lightbulb went on.”
Thus, after three years of professional experience a BombaySlowly the idea grows in the couple to devote themselves to something else. “Career prospects in India they were a lot Interesting“, explained Clear. “We have grown both professionally and personally – adds Francesco –. But back then, our idea became more and more concrete and we didn’t want to give up. We started not just dreaming, but drawing Cicero on paper and devoting every free minute for a year.”
When everything is ready, all you have to do is decide where to throw it. Asia? Europe? United States? “We figured if the dream really is to expand the territory in which we operate, then we absolutely have to start from home. We then got on our bikes Royal Enfield and we covered the 12,000 kilometers that separated us from home: from Bombay To Lecco“.
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“In Australia, recently widowed and with my newborn daughter. But I entered the world of building and made it”
The aim was to start the pilot project in early 2020. “Of course we didn’t plan that Pandemic“. The official start is delayed by a year and shifts the idea in the direction of “the only one a glimmer of hope what has remained in the tourist market: Proximity”. For the first three months within the startups there is only Chiara and Francesco. “Then we noticed potential, then we needed a hand”. At the end of 2021, the team will consist of ten people. Today there are 21. “By the end of 2023 we will reach 35,” explains Francesco.
As is so often the case with startups, Cicero’s life has been a real rollercoaster ride. “We’ve already stopped counting the ups and downs, the unexpected satisfactions and the slips“. The platform offers 150 “proximity experiences” in 13 regions of Italy that draw people into history ArtistHandyman, entrepreneur or instructors who love their territory. The goal of Francis And Clear it seeks to provide a valid alternative to the “hit and run” flows of standardized tourism by placing the human as the source of the narrative and their stories at the center of the experiences.
When the biggest challenge abroad is experiencing another culture without having any strengths of your own (“Culture And Family“), returned to Italy the situation is reversed. “There difficulty it becomes a re-adaptation to ancient traditions and customs, immersed between people who have not been exposed to the same experiences and who have difficulty understanding the differences you want to import. Italy – he explains Clear – is unbelievable Prettyhow often closed and reluctant to change”.
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Osteopath in Belgium. “In Italy, many hours for a thousand euros and zero contributions. I have a studio here and I coordinate 7 people.”
And yet, if we talk about it startupsThe concessions “In Italy they have little to envy European markets“, explained Francis. Not to mention some forms financing publicwhich “exceed all expectations, so that many foreign startups are now applying for our tenders, because in countries such as Germany, France And Great Britain There is no such thing.” The real limit lies in the capital market, which “must also be made attractive for foreign funds”.
In ten years, Chiara and Francesco imagine themselves at the forefront of a project that has become International. The original idea was to create Cicero India (“an infinite market, ever-growing but immature,” they say). Other European markets, not to mention the American ones, “would have access to Capital city Easier”. Then she actually won Heart on the Ground.
“We said to ourselves that if we could get Cicero up and running in Italy and let it grow, most of it would be done. Italy is home and therefore everything. We spent our lives running away from here because it was tight – they reason – and then kept coming back because we couldn’t do without it.”