 He belonged to a well known Genoese family who had a shipbuilding and trading business.The Piaggio family had traded with Peru since the 18th century, though it is only in the mid 19th century that some family members decide to start new businesses in America.In 1862, the Piaggio family loses an important part of its fleet in an act of war with the Ottoman Empire, it is during this crisis that some family members decided to go to America to start new businesses.