Leslie J. Schirato (born 1955), nicknamed “Australia’s Coffee King”, is an Australian entrepreneur and the chief executive officer of Vittoria Food & Beverage (Cantarella Bros), an Australian supplier and distributor of European food.

Biography

Leslie J. Schirato was born in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

in 1955 to

Italian immigrants The Italian diaspora is the large-scale emigration of Italians from Italy. There were two major Italian diasporas in Italian history. The first diaspora began around 1880, two decades after the Risorgimento, Unification of Italy, and ended in the ...

. At the age of 16, he started working for the Cantarella Bros as a part-time employee over the school holidays, and began working full-time with the company in 1972. In 1976, Schirato left the Cantarella Bros to work for David’s Holding and later on he secured a position with

Fiat Fiat Automobiles S.p.A. (, , ; originally FIAT, it, Fabbrica Italiana Automobili di Torino, lit=Italian Automobiles Factory of Turin) is an Italian automobile manufacturer, formerly part of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, and since 2021 a subsidiary ...

as a sales manager. After a 5-year absence, he returned to the Cantarella Group in 1981. At this point, Schirato was working in a sales and marketing capacity, and one of his first projects was to introduce

espresso Espresso (, ) is a coffee-brewing method of Italian origin, in which a small amount of nearly boiling water (about ) is forced under of pressure through finely-ground coffee beans. Espresso can be made with a wide variety of coffee beans and ...

coffee to the Australian supermarket. Schirato states that this was particularly challenging as it was a time when coffee was viewed as an instant beverage and luxury European coffee like espresso was not highly demanded by consumers. Schirato was laughed at when he tried to promote the company's Vittoria Coffee brand to supermarkets and many of his peers in the coffee industry said that pure coffee would be too strong for Australians. Today, the pure coffee industry is worth over $487 million. In 1993, Schirato was promoted to group managing director.

Awards and Recognitions

* Ernst & Young National Entrepreneur of the Year 2001 (Retail, Consumer & Industrial Products)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schirato, Les Living people 1955 births Australian businesspeople Members of the Order of Australia Australian company founders