Turning down the offer of a lifetime to take on #40m debt

offer which would have made him a millionaire several times over.

Instead he took on a debt of almost #40m and became the head of

Britain's fourth largest confectionery company.

The 40-year-old boss of Alma Confections, an independent firm with

annual sales of #12m, had been approached by an American multi-national

company to acquire and run Barker and Dobson, Callard and Bowser and his

own Kirkcaldy-based family business.

Two days before signing the deal that would have made him the

international president of a debt-free European confectionery giant,

Maciocia decided that no matter the wealth and status on offer, he did

not want to work for someone else.

''I decided it was not what I wanted,'' said the father of three.

''Most of the things I do want in life I already have.''

In 10 days, with the backing of the Scottish financial world, he had

borrowed #39.5m of ''London'' venture capital, purchased the Barker and

Dobson Group and bought out his mother and brothers making them quite

wealthy in the process.

That was last year. Now relocated in Dundee, Maciocia, known as Mario

to all his workers, controls a sweetie empire heading for annual sales

of more than #66m in 62 countries.

Chairman and chief executive of Alma Holdings, he has enthusiastically

masterminded an #8.5m investment programme which will transform the

former jam and toffee-making factory into one of the most modern sugar

confectionery plants in Europe and bring 280 new jobs to Tayside.

The next stage will be to move production from Alma's aged factory and

former headquarters in Kirkcaldy, to premises on a new site at

Glenrothes. The aim is to concentrate production from seven old plants

in the hi-tech, low-cost units at Stockport, Glenrothes and Dundee. The

present workforce of 1100 will be slimmed down to 800 people producing

#70m worth of confectionery.

While some of the big confectionery groups have been struggling, Alma

has proved to be one of the major success stories in Europe.

Not only have they acquired 150 to 200-year-old brand names, they have

built new products and exploited the popularity of screen characters

from television and films.

Two of the most successful have been Ghostbusters and Masters of the

Universe, but they will pale into insignificance as a result of Alma's

most recent coup. They have secured exclusive confectionery rights to

the Batman movie.

Household brand names in Alma's line-up are Angus Toffee, Old Everton

Mints, Keiller's Toffee and Butterscotch, Victory V., Hacks, Barker and

Dobson, Bensons, and Squirrel's Dolly Mixtures. In addition they make a

large volume of own-name brands for Marks and Spencer and Sainsburys.

As his name suggests, Mario is of Italian descent. His great

grandfather settled in Kirkcaldy in 1902 and, like many of his

countrymen, started off by making ice cream and selling sweets. It was

not until the early fifties that the family opened its first sweetie

factory.

Although born into sweetie making, Mario, the eldest son of a family

of eight, is not a hands-on confectioner. Educated in Kirkcaldy and

later at George Watson's and Heriot-Watt University, he moved south

after a spell at the family chocolate factory. Tempered by the white-hot

heat of the furnace they call the London commodities market where he

sweated for seven years, he is probably Scotland's glowing example of a

Yuppie -- an upwardly mobile businessman, financial highflyer,

infectiously ambitious, innovative and successful.

When he returned to Kirkcaldy in 1984 to join his mother and brother

in running Alma they were doing #1.2m a year, making a respectable 10%

net profit and were debt free.

In the first year, by broadening the range and getting others to

manufacture under licence, he hoisted sales to #5m and by the end of

three years they had reached #12m.

This was achieved from the factory in Kirkcaldy where his father

produced one of Scotland's most popular cheap sweets -- Skiffle Discs.

Mario's input was slightly more gimmicky. He thought up chocolate

polar bears, white mice, pink elephants, and best known and most

profitable of all, Skull Crushers.

The white chocolate heads filled with ''blood curdling'' red fondant

were an instant hit with children -- and grown ups -- throughout the

sweet-eating world. Particularly popular in the Far East and in the

United States, Skull Crushers played an important role in the meteoric

growth of Alma.

Expansion into Ireland, where he set up a separate company, was

followed by the #2.3m acquisition of Squirrel Horne of Stockport,

manufacturers of the original dolly mixtures. In three years they had

lost #1.6m, but in five months under Maciocia's direction they made

#230,000.

He will feel the burden of having borrowed #39.5m for some time to

come, but denies he has lost any sleep over the huge debt.

With such liabilities could Alma go bust? Mario believes not. ''The

group is now far too big and too many people want to buy it,'' he

claimed.

''My biggest fear is that with institutional investors, and the extent

of the problems we faced through Barker and Dobson we could run out of

money and have to recapitilise.''

In two to three years time Alma will probably ''go public'', and pay

back its debtors that way. Whatever happens it appears that despite

turning down an offer of a lifetime Mario is well on his way, in his own

time, to making his own millions.