Billionaire Perfetti Brothers Add to Italy Candy Fortune

In 1946, brothers Ambrogio and Egidio Perfetti took over their father’s small candy workshop in Lainate, Italy. One of the their earliest products was the country’s first brand of chewing gum, Brooklyn, which featured the iconic New York City bridge on the wrapper.

During the next six decades, the brothers transformed the business into Perfetti Van Melle SpA, the world’s sixth-largest confectionery and maker of Mentos mints and Airheads taffy. The closely held Milan-based company reported 2.37 billion euros ($3.15 billion) in revenue in 2011, up 12 percent from a year earlier amid increased demand from emerging markets such as India, where sales rose 169 percent from 2007 through 2012, according to a research report by Euromonitor International.