The maker of Nutella, Michele Ferrero dies on Valentine’s Day

Michele Ferrero was the patriarch of the eponymous family empire best known for its Nutella and Ferrero Rocher chocolates. He was the world's richest candy maker whose Nutella chocolate and hazelnut spread helped raise generations of Europeans and defined Italian sweets.

The company was one of Italy's most successful, a prime example of the "Made in Italy"
brand of food and luxury goods

Ferrero died on Valentine’s Day in Montecarlo where he lived after being ill for several months, surrounded with his family. He is 89.

Forbes magazine described Ferrero as “the richest candyman on the planet”. He and his family were ranked 30th on Forbes’ list of the world's richest billionaires in 2014, said to be worth $23.4 billion.

The company is one of Italy's most successful "Made in Italy" brands of food. The 1990s Ferrero Rocher advert which goes "The Ambassador's receptions are noted in society for their host's exquisite tastes..." and features towers of the gold-wrapped chocolates, has gone down in advertising history and been repeatedly parodied in popular culture.

Ferrero was the patriarch of the eponymous family empire
best known for its Nutella and Ferrero Rocher chocolates.

Ferrero dreamt up the chocolate-hazelnut Nutella spread, Ferrero Rocher pralines in 1982, Kinder eggs in 1968 and Tic Tac sweets, turning a provincial chocolate factory into what is widely seen as Italy’s most valuable privately-owned company.

Italian President Sergio Mattarella praised Ferrero as one of the leaders of Italian industry, "always ahead of his time thanks to innovative products and his tenacious work and reserved character."

Ferrero's father, Pietro, started making Nutella when cocoa was still rationed during World War II. Pietro Ferrero opened his first chocolate laboratory in Alba, in Italy's northwest Piemonte region, in 1942. The business passed to Michele upon Pietro's death in 1949.

By 1997, Michele Ferrero handed over the running of the company to his two sons, Pietro and Giovanni. Pietro Ferrero died in 2011 of a cardiac arrest, leaving Giovanni the sole CEO.

He never let outsiders buy into the company, which his father set up in 1946.

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