The new Leather Cluster Barcelona committee brings together 17 young professionals to share challenges, generate connections and drive the generational handover of the leather industry.

Leather Cluster Barcelona has held the first meeting of the Leather Young Club, the cluster’s Sectoral Youth Committee, an initiative created with the aim of establishing a permanent space for meeting, connection and development for the new generations of professionals in the leather industry.

The event brought together 17 young professionals from different member companies, who had the opportunity to learn in greater depth about the mission, services and strategic projects promoted by Leather Cluster Barcelona in areas such as innovation, sustainability, internationalisation, training and European projects.

One of the highlights of the session was the individual presentation by the participants, who shared the history of their companies, many of them family businesses, their role within their organisations and their view of the sector’s main future challenges.

This exercise generated a highly enriching exchange of experiences and made it possible to identify shared concerns, challenges and interests among the young professionals, especially on matters related to generational handover, innovation, talent attraction and the evolution of business models.

The meeting also served to open a participatory debate on the group’s needs, the Committee’s future lines of work and the activities that can bring most value to its members. The networking generated among the participants highlighted the importance of continuing to promote spaces for connection that strengthen the cohesion of the sector, facilitate the exchange of knowledge and encourage the emergence of new collaborations.

An initiative that responds to members’ needs

The creation of the Leather Young Club responds to one of the concerns identified during the individual visits that the Leather Cluster Barcelona team has made to member companies in recent months: the need to support the generational handover and to involve the new generations in the industry’s future challenges.

At these meetings, cluster manager Mònica Santamans and project manager Carla Vélez presented the cluster’s Master Plan and gathered information on the situation, needs and priorities of each company.

This process makes it possible to get to know members better, to segment them according to their profile and needs, and to move forward in the development of more tailored services and initiatives. Among the shared needs, generational handover has emerged as one of the strategic areas for guaranteeing the continuity, competitiveness and innovation capacity of the sector.

Leather Cluster Barcelona takes a very positive view of this first meeting and will continue working so that the Leather Young Club becomes a benchmark space for young professionals, encourages their active participation within the cluster and helps to prepare the leaders who will drive the future of the leather industry.

Leather Cluster Barcelona is an environment of competitive cooperation for promoting cross-cutting and transformative strategic projects with the aim of driving forward the ecosystem of the Catalan leather sector within the framework of Shared Value policies. The cluster is an accredited body within the Catalonia Clusters programme and has the support of Acció.