An Attempt at Piecing Together the Carmina/Meermin/Yanko Relationship

Discussion

Hi folks,

I was inspired by a recent post on Yanko shoes to try and figure out the strange and complicated relationship between Yanko, Carmina and Meermin. Here's the result of my research:

Pre-Yanko/Yanko:

In 1866, Matías Pujadas opened a workshop in Inca, Mallorca.

In 1905, his son Mateo Pujadas opened one of the first factories in the Balearic Islands using Goodyear-welt construction.

From u/j_albaladejo's post in the comments:

Mateo has 4 four sons. One of them it's Magdalena, the mother of Pepe. Magdalena was the chief of the stiching section of factory. And there is where Jose Albaladejo appears.

In 1961, José Albaladejo Pujadas took over, creating Yanko. Yanko stepped up production to the point that they put out over a million shoes per year. Yanko used to be buyable on SkyValet and had a fair presence in Japan and China. By the late 90s, though, demand for luxury shoes dropped, and Chinese shoemakers began to take over the market; their ability to make a larger quantity of shoes for a cheaper price was the main reason for this.

Albaladejo/Carmina: (Brand Spotlight: Carmina Shoemaker)

From u/j_albaladejo's post in the comments:

Jose was married with Carmina, and had 6 sons. 2 of them found Meermin and the other 4 are working and managing Carmina.

In 1997, José Albaladejo Pujadas left Yanko to form a new company initially called Albaladejo. This name was changed (at the request of other members of the family) to Carmina Shoemaker, which was named after José's wife and youngest daughter, who are both named Carmina.

Meermin: (Brand Spotlight: Meermin)

In 2001, José Albaladejo (not Pujadas) and his brother Sandro also left Yanko and set up a new brand called Meermin, which was named after a classic sailing boat from the 50s owned by the family (the name is Dutch for 'mermaid'). For the first few years, Meermin worked exclusively in the Japanese market, selling through high-end department stores, before going off on their own to cut out the cost of middlemen. Sometime after, Pepe Albaladejo took over as the proprietor of the company, though both José and Sandro Albaladejo (not Pujadas) still work there.

Meermin was founded by members of the 3rd and 4th generation of the Albaladejo family. Pepe, in one interview, refers to the founder of Yanko (i.e. José Albaladejo Pujadas) as "my grandfather". Therefore, we can observe that the founders of Meermin are of the generation after that of the founder of Yanko/Carmina. The lineage thus looks like:

Matías Pujadas > Mateo Pujadas > Magdalena Pujadas > José Albaladejo Pujadas (Yanko/Carmina) -> José/Sandro Albaladejo (Meermin) -> Pepe Albaladejo (Meermin).

Yanko, Now:

Yanko still seems to exist even without the Albaladejos, however. Yanko's biography page notes that a man named Antonio Llobera and his business partners acquired the company in 2007 after what they claim was financial mismanagement ("una mala gestión financiera") by the old owners. They still have a factory in Mallorca.

Yanko still has an active website, and still sells shoes both online and in stores, although they don't appear to own any brick-and-mortar stores of their own. They also seem to do GMTOs, according to this SF thread.

Speculation:

It seems like there was some kind of family schism somewhere along the line, but details are comparatively scarce. Just about every interview with José Albaladejo Pujadas or Pepe Albaladejo that references the difference between the two companies results in a rather nonspecific reply of "yes, they're a different branch of the family and our operations are separate" and not much else. Ron Rider commented that the situation was very complicated, but didn't elaborate.

Another poster on SF weighs in on the subject of this 'financial mismanagement':

In 1997 Albaladejo sold Yanko to a Catalan family called Camps for the symbolic price of 1 peseta [...] The company was bankrupt at that time and had 190 employees. In 2005 Yanko was again in bad shape and had to declare in what Americans called chapter 11. The situation was a bit more complex than before as the company had purchased another company called Pielsa (manufacturers of boat shoes) the collateral for the money loaned by the banks to purchase Pielsa was the Yanko brand name.

1997 - the same year that José Albaladejo Pujadas started Albaladejo/Carmina! What I can infer from this is that he sold Yanko to the Camps after the company declared bankruptcy, and then went off to make his own company along with his wife and kids, leaving the rest of the family employed by the Camps (since Meermin's founders left Yanko in 2001, some four years later). Perhaps there was some resentment here? This is a quandary that bears further investigation. If you come across any info that might lend some further clarity to this speculation, please forward it to me if possible.

Timeline:

1866: Matías Pujadas opens his workshop.
1905: Mateo Pujadas, son of Matías, opens one of the first factories in the Balearic Islands using Goodyear-welted construction.
1961: José Albaladejo Pujadas creates Yanko. Yanko grows until they are producing over a million shoes per year.
1997: By this point, Chinese competition has forced Yanko into bankruptcy. José Albaladejo Pujadas sells Yanko to a Catalan family called the Camps and forms a new shoemaking company called Albaladejo, which changes its name soon after to Carmina. José Albaladejo and his brother Sandro, the sons of José Albaladejo Pujadas, remain in Yanko for the next four years.
2001: José and Sandro Albaladejo leave Yanko and form their own company, named Meermin. José's son Pepe becomes proprietor of Meermin somewhere along the line.
2005: Yanko experiences another bout of financial hardship, declaring bankruptcy again. They default on a loan from the bank that they'd used to buy the Pielsa company, and the brand name is presumably ceded to the bank.
2009: Antonio Llobera and his business partners purchase Yanko. Yanko continues to sell shoes in Japan, China and Spain.

Have I missed or misinterpreted anything here? Does anyone have any observations to add? Send me a message or post a reply!

EDIT #1: Fixed some info on Yanko.

EDIT #2: Added a timeline for easy reference. Added some info on Mateo Pujadas and clarified some sentences.

EDIT #3: Fixed some stuff so this will be a better reference in the future.

EDIT #4: Grammar/syntax fixes. Added links to relevant Brand Spotlight threads.

EDIT #5: Incorporated some stuff from the comments. Will possibly parse a bit more later.

Posted Jan 27, 2015, 7:26 AM UTC · edited

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