Franco Dompé is a passionate sportsman since childhood. During university, he plays a wide range of sports, such as rowing, swimming, track and field, and rugby. But its during his trip to Cortina d’Ampezzo in 1936, that he falls in love with one in particular, bobsledding. This winter sport, which at the time was only popular in Northern Europe, will shortly after influence Franco’s entrepreneurial journey.
On January 9th 1937, Franco crashes violently with his bobsled during a training. In the following two years, he will undergo a great number of surgeries and, most importantly, choose his career path: build a company with the mission to help the doctors’ job, along with the convalescents’ recovery. This will happen in November 1940, when he sets up Dompé farmaceutici.
Despite the terrible accident, Franco doesn’t give up bobsledding. After WWII, he is among the founders of Bob Club Cortina and in 1950 he races with the national Italian team at the world championship, ranking 6th. Two years later, at 41 years old, he reaches the peak of his sports career by racing in the Olympic Winter Games in Oslo.
In 1956, Franco participates once again to the Olympic Winter Games, but this time as sponsor of the sporting event: Dompé farmaceutici, in fact, provides to the athletes racing in Cortina d’Ampezzo the necessary medication, transporting drugs on 28 branded vans. This collaboration has a strong impact on the company’s communication strategy: from the Cortina Olympic Games onwards, sport will play a leading role in Dompé’s ad campaigns.
