Giletta

The story of Giletta

Founded in 1950, Giletta started its operations as a distributor of agricultural machinery. In the years immediately following, the company started as a production company of hay elevators, fertiliser spreaders, and manure spreaders. In 1966, according to a request of a private contractor that carrying out snow clearing operations on the provincial road, Giletta designed a sand and salt spreader. The spreader had a double feed chain, which was the technology used in the production of agricultural machines and had a capacity of 11 cubic metres, suitable for a 6x4 truck. At that time, the largest spreader in Europe was 6 cubic metres, and therefore the new machine represented a great novelty on the market for which the first highways, in order to reduce the number of vehicles, started to buy the new spreader. Thus began the first diversification, from a manufacturer of agricultural machinery to a manufacturer of winter maintenance equipment. 

Defined by innovation

Working closely with the customers, attention to details and quality has defined Giletta as one of the most innovative manufacturers in the industry. In 1976, with the introduction of the electronic control of the amount of salt spread based on the speed of the vehicle, Giletta enabled customers to control the amount of material spread. In 1978, the 15 cubic meters spreader was launched and already in 1980, Giletta introduced the first chloride spreader with the pre-wetting system, representing a revolution in winter maintenance due to the significantly lowered risk of accidents. 

In 1989, the first fully modular spreader was patented and further steps were taken for digital control of spreading operations with the Ecosat microprocessor. The fully automated satellite control of chloride spreading operations dates back to 1998. In 1999, at the request of the largest Italian motorway company managing in real-time a significant amount of snow-clearing vehicles on the Apennine mountain motorway, the first digital system for tracking and remote control of winter operations was developed.

A Bucher company

In 2002, Giletta joined Bucher Municipal group and made its entry into high-potential markets. In order to complete the range of products and to offer the various markets a full set-up of the vehicles for winter roads, SnowTec, a French manufacturer of innovative snow ploughs, was acquired in 2003. In the acquisition, Bucher Municipal also took over Arvel, the Giletta-owned distributor founded in 1997 responsible for sales and service of winter maintenance equipment in France.  

In 2005, the new Bucher UniQa spreader was introduced and the modularisation of production was fully implemented with robotic welding, double-layer powder coating, epoxy with high zinc content, and polyester as well as assembly lines for all products. Furthermore, in 2009, the company invested in Saet, a company specialised in the design and production of electronic controls and related wiring, in order to increase the know-how in all electronic devices for the further strengthening of intelligent products. 

Multiple brands and multiple applications

The growth of the Bucher Municipal winter maintenance portfolio continues with the acquisition of the Spanish distributor Maquiafalt in 2011, and in 2012 with the acquisition of Assaloni.com, a historic manufacturer of snow clearing equipment, famous all over the world above all for the patented telescopic snow ploughs. In 2014, the Kaluga production facility in Russia was opened, built for the production of all the equipment destined for this important market, some of which were specifically designed for extreme working conditions in the region.