I can chime in as to whether actual Benotto family members were involved with frame production in Mexico. Not that long ago---actually it was 1996---I was on a flight down to Lima with a stop over in Mexico City. The main issue, it was long flight any way you look at it. During the LA to Mexico portion, I had the pleasure of sitting next to this semi-elderly woman that I now guess is in her mid-70s. She was sprite, outgoing and spoke English with very little accent. While making small talk, I brought up the mention of bicycles (obviously my favorite subject). Her eyes lit up as if I had surprised her somehow. She then chimes in that she is originally from Italy and her son brought the family bicycle business to Mexico and if I had heard of the name, Benotto! Well obviously, my eyes then lit up as she tells me that while she no longer lives in Mexico City, one of her sons still does and some portion of the Benotto operations still resides there. She indicated that no family member was an actual frame builder in the Mexico factory, but merely supervised production efforts with a few builders they brought over from Italy. I recall her telling me that the actual son that brought the productions over to Mexico was no longer there, but a younger son remains. I also got the impression that the frames are no longer be made there, but some type of operations still do. In any case, I can't recall what portion of their operations still remain, but I can distinctly recall the animated and proud presence this woman exuded once she found out that I was some sort of bike nut. Its a small world I guess. Cheers- Dave Anderson Cut Bank MT
p.s. for the life of me, i can't recall this woman's name, but I think it was something like "Abby" or Abagail. Yes, I know that doesn't sound Italian, sorry.
In a message dated 2/27/2004 2:51:11 PM PST, themaaslands@comcast.net writes: It is my understanding that initially, Benotto himself did build the frames carrying the family name. The subsequent generations were seemingly not as directly involved with production, so by the time that the move to Mexico did take place 40 years later, it is completely possible that no member of the Benotto family was involved in production and that the frames were made outside, just like what happened with parts of the production of Colnago, Masi, Pinarello, Cinelli... etc. De Rosa is one of the rare companies that only made in house in those years. This in-house production also did mean that they never really had excess production capacity, so it is highly unlikely that they would have built for Benotto.