Azienda
Company
La storia
History
From the founding
to the nineties
During the 80’s, the skilled confectioner
Domenico Maurelli, from the Pompeii
district, decided to set up his own
business. He exploited the know how
acquired from local producers and, with
the support of other people, he opened
a workshop that put on the market
handmade frozen food, short pastry
and ricce (“curly”) sfogliatelle, that kept
all the organoleptic features of fresh
products. His business was successful,
it thrived and attracted the attention of
numerous pastry-making professionals.
L’Arca was founded in the early
nineties, thanks to new partners, Ciro
Buondonno in particular. The firm
acquired considerable dimensions after
moving to a larger structure where to
the confectionary activity, supervised
by Maurelli, was added the marketing
of raw materials managed by Maurelli’s
partners: flours, creams, and other
confectionary-related products. Product
distribution was mainly directed to bars
in Campania.
The years 2000
During the early 2000’s, an important
change occurred: the business activity
was moved to the Salerno district, in the
Sarno industrial area, and the premises
occupied a 5,000 square metres area of
which 2,600 square metres destined to
be a large plant. The firm bought new
machinery, the personnel employed
and the range of products became
bigger and bigger. During this stage,
L’Arca maintained its two branches:
the production sector, supervised by
Maurelli, and the marketing sector,
supervised by the other partners.
Only later, in 2010, the owners of the
firm decided to concentrate only on
production and the marketing sector was
acquired by an independent partner.
L’Arca’s policy was successful and
over the years the product range was
enlarged so that to include savoury and
sweet products which were suitable for
every moment of the day and not only
for breakfast: starters, aperitifs; there
were products suitable for parties,
anniversaries and festivities, too. The
firm became stronger thanks to its ability
to meet the requests of a market that is
interested in semi-industrial processing
that maintains, also in the product shape,
rare craftsmanlike features. The firm’s
claim identifies faithfully and without
doubts the true nature of the business
activity: frozen products, frozen semifinished products, sweet and savoury.
Health concerns are proved by a line of
wholesome healthy products, based on
cereals.
Today’s Arca
The firm continued its business activity
and in 2013, thanks to a company
shake-up, there was a fresh new start.
L’Arca changed its name in Arca and
this new brand is today an important
firm, with an internal organization that
presents, at the top, a Sole Administrator,
Domenico Maurelli and, thanks to the
precious contribution of the other partner
Ciro Buondonno, a real Mr Fixit of the
firm, has a Production Management,
a Marketing Management, a Quality
Control Sector and a Research and
Development Sector.
Highly
qualified
and
specialized
personnel is regularly trained and
kept up to date about new working
procedures, sanitary conditions and raw
materials processing. The national and
international customer portfolio (Europe,
USA, South America, China and Arab
world) is now wider and it includes
both large-scale retail trade (OLSRT)
and specialized wholesalers. The firm
supplies local bars, confectioner’s
shops, bakers, hotels, restaurants,
catering businesses, pubs, ice store
and ice-cream parlours. To enhance its
development, Arca works with Naples
University “Federico II” and thus it takes
advantage of the university researchers’
know how, a precious help to solve
4
problems and improve product quality.
The constant effort to improve the quality
of its products has also led the firm to
carefully choose its suppliers both on
the basis of raw materials quality and
the safeguard of the environment. With
this regard, the certificate acquired over
the years are fundamental: ISO9001,
ISO14001 and the EU quality mark
(see the certificate page). Arca is also
registered with the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration, which allows it to export to
the USA.
CERTIFICAZIONI / CERTIFICATES
The future
The constant search for new markets,
Extra-European ones too, leads Arca
towards the future and pushes it to
employ new professional figures such as
export specialists, to scan and identify the
demand for top-quality Italian products.
With this regard, Arca already operates
abroad with specific events and tastings
to promote its products on an international
level. The main aim is, on one hand,
to implement an already well-founded
activity, acquire certificates that can pave
the way to the Ar