The family behind Carmina, Meermin and Yanko

There are several Spanish shoemakers well regarded in enthusiast community, while you think they are independent, the fact is one certain family stand behind them all. This family is the Albaladejo Pujas family from Mallorca.

Carmina

Even today, some Spanish are still used to call Carmina another name, maybe the original name, Albaladejo. The real owner of this brand is Jose Albadadejo Pujas and one of his sons and two daughters.

Meermin

Meermin is owned by the other two sons of Jose Albadadejo Pujas and his grandsons. With the success of Carmina and so extensive experience in shoemaking, Meermin’s success is foreseeable.

Yanko

In fact, Yanko is the real son of Jose Albaladejo Pujas, but it was. At the heyday of Yanko, it employed more than 900 workers, and produced 1 million pairs per year. Nowadays, Allen Edmonds is the highest volume Goodyear welted shoemaker in the world, and its production volume is only 300 thousand.

Sadly Yanko went bankrupt in 1990s for unknown reason. The brand was sold to Xavier Camp for 1 ceta. Thereafter, Yanko changed hand in three owners, in the end, Toni Llobera (the owner of TLB) and Pedro Galindo took it over.

It is rumored that Yanko is still using the lasts from Carmina and even the newly developed lasts are quite similar to last Rain and Simpson, the icons of Carmina.

The biggest problem of Yanko is no one really cares of it and only sells in Swedish online shoe shop Skylox.

Conclusion

Among so many Spanish brands, the best are all owned by Albaladejo Pujas family, so you have to admit they know something about shoemaking.