The Peyrano family and chocolate in Turin

  A Torinese family

Towards the turn of the 19th century, Antonio (born in 1880) was working as an apprentice with the firm Baratti & Milano, attending at the same time an evening class at the “Cavour” school of chemistry (not to be mixed up with the high school bearing the same name). After achieving his certificate he continued attending the school as an experimenter.

In 1912 he started a new experience with the Capobianchi firm at Ancona, where he was taken on as an expert in sweets. He moved to Ancona along with his sisters Lucia and Giovanna, as well as with his nephew Giacomo.

Lucia was also taken on in the same firm as supervisor for the wrapping of sweets, carried out manually by twenty young girls. Capitalizing on this experience, Lucia returned to Turin at the beginning of 1915 and started up production and sale of sweets in the current-day premises of the Peyrano firm. However, she was forced to stop her business because of the war.

In 1917 Antonio, Giovanna and Giacomo jr. returned to Turin. In 1919, after the end of the war, Lucia Peyrano’s firm resumed production and sale of sweets with the help of Antonio and of the other family members.

However, competition from the large industrial producers, specialized in this sector and equipped with costly machines, convinced Antonio to put his stakes on another product: chocolate.