On April 20th, The Prada Group partially reopened its workshop in Tuscany, recalling approximately 300 employees back to work in the leather goods, apparel and footwear departments at its Arezzo premises, in order to facilitate prototyping and sample-making departments essential for developing the company’s forthcoming collections. The company’s factories in Umbria, Marche and Veneto partially reopened next, followed lastly by the collection and sample-making workshops at the Milan headquarters.

In collaboration with local authorities and with advocates from Health and Safety services, the company has taken measures to protect its employees. These measures include reduced hours, correct social distancing between workspaces, the distribution of protective equipment (including gloves, masks, and hand sanitizer), full room sanitizing twice daily, and on-site nurses to perform serological testing on employees.

Those who test positive will also receive a viral test on-site from a team of specialized nurses. The Prada Group will test its employees on a monthly basis and cover all costs of the approximately 1,000 tests per week.  If any employees test positive, the company will also extend the double screening process to their family members. There is no current end date set for the screening program.

Patrizio Bertelli, Prada Group’s CEO, said: “In this emergency situation we have not only been considering when to reopen our manufacturing facilities but above all how to reopen them in total security, in order to safeguard our employees’ health and protect them from the virus. We therefore immediately sought advice from leading healthcare facilities and from specialist pharmaceutical companies to identify the top-rated medical technology currently available to safeguard the health of our employees with these virus-screening procedures and to contain the virus. The introduction of these measures means we can now confidently restart production in Tuscany, and look forward to extending the above protocols to our plants and offices in other regions when they reopen”.