Crazy: the crazy story of a brand born in Bormio

Athlete, artist and visionary. For 30 years, Valeria Colturi has been at the helm of Crazy, the Made in Italy brand, which has made its way among the giants of the market, making itself known and appreciated thanks to its high quality, performing and at the same time eclectic products. Alongside Valeria there is Luca Salini who, both at home and in the company, supports Valeria and with her courageously carries on Crazy’s mission.

Valeria, what is your story? What is the one of Crazy?
I was born in Bormio, in the mountains, where it’s normal for people to practice sports from an early age. I started in the Alta Valtellina ski club as a cross-country skier, later I competed for the Central Alps Committee. Since I was a child, however, I have had a thousand other passions and have always been a very creative and “manual” person. I loved clothing but I wanted clothes made exactly “as I said”, I didn’t like what the market offered, so I started creating my own clothes by sewing them myself: being able to create a garment from nothing gave me a truly galvanizing feeling. In the meantime, I was carrying on my career as a cross-country ski athlete but, as with everyday clothes, I didn’t like the suits that my ski club gave me: I always ended up taking them apart and personalizing them, so much that my teammates started asking me to do the same with theirs. At the time I used to stop skiing at one pm and immediately afterwards I visited all the shops in the area looking for leftovers and fabrics that I liked, usually they were unusual patterns and colors, never seen on the ski slopes. In the evening and at night I sewed. Collecting lycra scraps, I then moved onto creating swimwear and cycling bibs, a sport that I used to practice in summer as cross-country skiing training. A few people started appreciating my creations so I thought: why not try to sell them to stores too? I put together a small sample that was immediately appreciated and I ended up having so many orders that the hours of a day were not enough for me to realize them all! This is the beginning of Crazy, a real story of passion since 1989.

Where does the choice of the name come from? And what about the logo and all the creative aspect?
Initially the first garments made had the “Vale di Valeria Colturi” logo, the name Crazy came later and is certainly linked to what my family said when, at 18, I decided not to continue skiing to throw myself into this adventure: everyone thought it was a crazy idea! Today the company is called just Crazy, a shorter and more immediate name that we think works better. The two triangles of the logo are the V and A of Valeria, the C of Crazy was inserted later.

Luca, you are both a couple and work colleagues: how did you become passionate about the outdoor world and what are your roles in the company?
I was born and raised in Morbegno in Valtellina, but I lived for 4 years in San Martino Valmasino. Since I was young, I went to the mountains with my father and took part in many ski mountaineering and skyrunning competitions. In 1994, through mutual friends, I met Valeria in Val di Mello where we both climbed. Crazy was born in 1989 but at the time I was working in the automotive field. We only started collaborating later, in 2004, in the meantime we had two children. I was familiar with the ski mountaineering world because of my past competitions and I had sales experience thanks to my previous jobs, so why not combine it all by working at Crazy? Valeria continued to manage the creative part, the contacts with sports clubs and the relationships with stores, while I started looking for new customers by taking care of the commercial part. We went on in this way until 2015 when we decided to manage the company following more canonical methods: realizing a collection, offering it on the market and trying to expand abroad. In 2015/16 we repositioned the company and collections and decided to focus on everything we know best, the world of outdoor sports. The most important step was to define and name our product category. Fast&Light was born, a clear name that after we have used, it is now used by many other companies, but we can proudly say that we have defined its standards. Valeria now continues to take care of the entire research, development, study and style of the product while I follow the management part. What has remained unchanged from the past is that whatever comes out of Crazy, even the way we decide to communicate it on a marketing level, comes from Valeria’s vision.

Valeria, what need did Crazy want to satisfy when you created the brand?
Crazy has always been a very different brand from other outdoor brands. I started making models for myself because I didn’t like anything that was on the market at the time. I was the first to test them and to know what needs they had to meet. If you are an athlete you immediately realize what are the negative aspects of a garment, my added value was also knowing exactly how to turn them into positive aspects.

What kind of target are you referring to?
Valeria: All our products are realized always focusing on performance, but this does not mean that they can only be used by athletes, the tourist or the beginner can get numerous benefits from Crazy products. Surely they are ideal garments for people who are looking for a different style, out of the lines, indeed often only after using them many people discover that they were created to satisfy a specific technical need.

Luca: Crazy is primarily aimed at customers with very high expectations, they’re demanding consumers but not necessarily mountain sports experts. They are ideal products for all those who want to start off on the right foot and who may be inspired by those who have been going to the mountains for a long time. All this makes Crazy a decidedly inspirational brand.

All Crazy products are characterized by a Fast&Light approach: what does this mean? How is the production process structured? What is the inspiration behind a new garment?
Fast&Light means creating products without frills, without anything unnecessary, looking at elastic, light fabrics with eclectic patterns. I have always tried to make products that I felt mine, far from what society required, and the fact of having a good manual skills, but also of having practiced sports for which my clothes are designed, allowed me to express my creativity to the fullest, from the idea to the creation of a model, then testing it myself. Then, we must always start from the assumption that no one ever invents anything new, everyone copies which means, for a creative person like me, to take inspiration, even unconsciously, from the world around me: from fashion, to design, to art in general. I always observe everything carefully and with different eyes. Once I have the right inspiration, the design always starts from me even though I now have 10 collaborators at my side in the technical and style department, 6 of whom have followed me since the early years of the brand.

Luca, you have several stores, are they only single-brand or do they also deal with other brands? In which markets, besides the Italian one, have you expanded and which do you want to approach in the future?
Up to now we have 13 stores, 3 of which abroad: Prague, Chamonix and Carbondale, in the United States, a real strategic point for mountain sports, between Denver and Salt Lake City. Apart from 4 monobrand stores, the other shops are all under management, it is a real monobrand project done in collaboration with the shopkeepers themselves. In some of these stores there are some partner brands of accessories or skis and boots depending on where the store is located.

How important are online sales? What is the difference between direct sales in the store where a garment can be touched, explained and even tested? How do you choose the strategic points where to open?
We have a “service” e-commerce on which we never give discounts, it only serves end customers who cannot find something in the store: if that specific product is on the site, they can buy it and even have it delivered to their trusted store without shipping fees. This is because our main purpose is to support stores that represent the first sales channel for us. Online sale is the enemy of our shopkeepers, we want customers to go to the stores because there they will find someone competent who is always ready to advise them. Shops create communities and we strongly believe in the work of shopkeepers, both because they know the product but also because they know the territory, which is why we rely completely on them when we have to choose a new strategic point where to open a store.

What are the future plans for brand development?
The goal is certainly to grow the brand internationally. At the moment we are present in 8 European countries and in the United States, where we have just launched a first collection. We work very well in the Czech Republic, Austria, Slovakia, in the Bavarian part of Germany and in the enclave of Andorra, in the Pyrenees. We are also present in Switzerland, France and Spain, so in the future we would certainly like to consolidate these markets and then expand eastwards, for example in Poland and Bulgaria where there is a strong ski mountaineering tradition and where the outdoors world is growing fast. All this always carrying out our Fast&Light approach combined with the unique and eclectic style that distinguishes us, focusing on ski touring in winter and trekking and trail running in summer.

Do you also develop technical hardware products (boots, etc.) or do you intend to do that in the future?
In the past we have realized some models of skis and backpacks but now, by choice, we only make clothing because we believe it is the best and most immediate way to communicate who we are, our values and our mission, especially abroad. We have also decided to reduce the collection in terms of number and we have only a few continuous models in our line but with always different colorways. What is important for us is to keep up with the times and with the needs of the final consumer, using the best fabrics that the market offers and the latest technologies available. All this always following our Fast&Light philosophy and our creative approach. We are sure that those who produce everything for everyone have little specific competence, ending up doing everything wrong.

Valeria, you are also very active on a marketing level: how do you communicate Crazy nowadays? Athletes, events, socials, magazines, etc.
Since the beginning we have always worked a lot with athletes. At first they were my colleagues, then someone became an ambassador over the years, then we started to create our ski mountaineering and sky running teams, which we believed in from the beginning when they were not yet considered sports by other brands. All the great ski mountaineering athletes have passed by Crazy and many have remained friends. In addition to these two teams, we have recently become partner of the Italian National sky running team: their athletes will wear Crazy products for the next 3 years and there will be the Crazy Sky Running Italy Cup circuit. We also support various events, many of them are our customers towards whom we have a particular treatment because they buy race gadgets or clothing for the staff, while we are sponsors of others.

Sustainability is a very used term lately, often overused. How do you position yourself towards this issue?
For us, sustainability is, and always has been, an important issue, however it has never been much part of our communication because we believe it should be a starting point, not something to be achieved and on which, unfortunately, build a marketing strategy by communicating it as a fact out of the ordinary. I have always tried to pollute as little as possible: I started this adventure by reusing fabric scraps so as not to throw anything away and produce as little garbage as possible. Having a small collection always goes in this direction. Furthermore, we do not use plastic bags to pack the various items, for 4/5 years we have been delivering everything in paper which can then be reused in various ways. Our labels are also reduced to a minimum to take up as little space as possible and reduce the amount of transportation. Product tags are also reusable because they incorporate seeds which can then be planted.

Valeria, what are your medium/long-term projects? How do you imagine Crazy in 10 years?
I am very happy with the goals achieved in the last 30 years but I was also happy in my small laboratory at the beginning of this adventure, I was never interested in profit in itself, Crazy was born from the need to do something that I liked and I was passionate about. Every day I wake up thinking about what new I can accomplish and every day is different.