The orphaned heartthrob who was the king of perfumery and cosmetics

In the heart of the Vallès Oriental region, on a plot of land halfway between the Circuit de Catalunya and the town of Granollers, stands a large industrial building proudly displaying the COTY logo in highly visible blue letters. This is the main production center on the Iberian Peninsula for one of the world's largest multinational cosmetics and fragrance companies.

As a child, Joseph Maria Spoturno was orphaned and had to leave his native Ajaccio, Corsica, to live under the guardianship of relatives in mainland France. After fulfilling his military obligations, an acquaintance—the Corsican politician Emmanuel Arène—encouraged him to settle in Paris, where he worked as Arène's secretary. It was during this time that he decided to change his surname, as Spoturno sounded insufficiently French to him, and adopted the name his mother had worn before marriage, Coti, but altering the and Latin for a Greek. The result, Coty, is the brand that has reigned in the world of perfumery for over a century.

His first contact with the industry that would make him rich was through the pharmacist Raymond Goery, who manufactured and sold perfume from his shop in the French capital. Curiously, the relationship between the two had no connection to business, but rather stemmed from the endless card games they played together. He liked Goery's perfumes so much that he decided to try something similar, and so, in 1904, he formulated a fragrance called La Rose Jacqueminot, which proved to be a success. The name came from a type of rose created in the mid-19th century and named in honor of a general from the Napoleonic Wars.

The business grew meteorically, and in just a few years, Coty was already leading the market, especially after discovering the benefits of integrating the entire production chain under a single ownership. Before World War I, Coty opened branches in Moscow, London, and New York. It was also during this period that its product portfolio began to expand far beyond perfume, including cosmetics and beauty products for hair and skin. By the end of the war, Coty's consumers were spread across the globe.

The fortune Coty built was used to invest in other businesses, most notably the purchase of the newspaper Le Figaro (1922), which he used to spread his conservative and staunchly anti-communist ideas. But his political activism went beyond the theoretical and intellectual realm, because in the spring of 1933 he launched Solidarité Française, a political movement that evolved into a shock force. Two years after Coty's death, the group was dissolved as part of the authorities' campaign to eliminate the paramilitary and fascist groups operating in France at that time. In 1937, and without it being clear whether it was related to these subversive movements organized by Coty, fortified underground tunnels were discovered beneath the Château de Louveciennes, a property that had been part of the perfume and cosmetics magnate's estate. The tunnels extended for hundreds of meters and were excavated at a depth of one-sixteen meters.

In the 1920s, Coty was one of France's wealthiest individuals, which allowed him to finance a wide range of initiatives, from sports and science to artistic and healthcare activities. He even offered the national government the opportunity to establish a fund to stabilize the franc, which was experiencing a period of weakness in the mid-1920s. He also never forgot his Corsican roots, frequently allocating substantial funds to improve living conditions in Ajaccio: he financed the city's electrification and provided social housing. Furthermore, upon his death, he bequeathed 25 million francs to the Corsican capital. The final years of his life were marked by his divorce from his wife, who ultimately retained ownership of the newspaper. Le Figaro

As we mentioned from the beginning, today Coty is one of the world's leading cosmetics and perfume companies, with a turnover exceeding $6 billion and brands such as Lancaster, Wella, Bourjois, and Max Factor. Its headquarters are no longer in France, but are located in New York.