'Most important' companies in every Spanish province revealed

WHICH company is seen as the biggest, most significant, most lucrative, and best-known in each province in Spain? And do these correspond with the ones that report the highest earnings? Recent research sought to identify the corporations that are considered to be the most representative of their geographical area.

DataCentric's study was largely objective and quantitative, but also partly subjective, with other professionals and with private consumers asked for their views.

Interviews and statistics, evaluation of their presence online, size in terms of employees and turnover, and other factors that attempted to identify 'commercial relevance', 'cultural identity', and 'how deep-rooted they are socially' were compiled, and a map has been produced detailing what DataCentric concludes to be the 'most important' firms in every province.

'Most representative' in 2023 and 'highest turnover' in 2019

A similar map was created in July 2019 by Business Insider, based entirely on turnover – which corporation had the highest in its province – and some of these match the 'most important' as listed by DataCentric.

One such example was the supermarket chain Mercadona, in the province of Valencia, which features in both; another is Airbus Helicopters, which appears on the two maps for the province of Albacete in south-eastern Castilla-La Mancha.

Additionally, Cosentino – a construction supplier specialising in different types of stone – is both the 'most important' as at February 2023 and had the highest turnover as at July 2019 in the province of Almería, whilst in the same industry, the tile firm Pamesa Cerámica fit both descriptions in the province of Castellón, directly north of that of Valencia.

Continuing up the north-east coast, clothing chain Essity appears on the Business Insider 2019 and DataCentric 2023 maps for the province of Tarragona, as does the motor manufacturer Seat for the province of Barcelona.

In the far north-western region of Galicia, the 'most important' companies named for three of the four provinces are the same as those with the highest turnover three-and-a-half years ago: Coren foods in the land-locked province of Ourense, which borders the north of Portugal; Peugeot Citroën in that of Pontevedra and, naturally, the Inditex high-street fashion empire for that of A Coruña.

The latter is owned and was co-founded by Amancio Ortega, currently Spain's richest resident, and includes the global clothing chain Zara, along with other brands better known nationally such as Stradivarius, Pull&Bear, Massimo Dutti, Bershka, Lefties, Oysho, Uterqüe, and Zara Home.

Mostly, motor manufacturers feature on DataCentric's 'most important' map and also on Business Insider's 'highest turnover' map, as is the case with Seat and Peugeot – but not all.

Volkswagen (pictured below) in the single-province northern region of Navarra is another, but whereas Opel was found to be the biggest earner in the Aragón province of Zaragoza in 2019, the one named as 'most important' this year is the domestic appliance manufacturer Balay; and although Vidrala Glass was the most lucrative company for the inland Basque province of Álava (of which the capital is Vitoria) in 2019, the corporation considered 'most important' in 2023 is the Mercedes-Benz factory.

Likewise, the company with the greatest turnover in 2019 in the Castilla y León province of Ávila, to the west of Madrid, was the cheese manufacturer Ornua, yet in 2023, the firm considered to be the most representative of the province is the Nissan motor factory.

Other companies which feature on both maps are Incarlopsa foods in the eastern Castilla-La Mancha province of Cuenca, the betting firm Codere in the city-province of Melilla on the northern Moroccan coast – although for its fellow offshore enclave, Ceuta, the gambling company Luckia has been replaced by its competitor, Sportium – and nationwide electricity board Iberdrola in the Basque coastal province of Vizcaya, of which the capital is Bilbao.

In almost every case, though, the company revealed by Business Insider in July 2019 to be the highest-earning in each province is still the one with the largest turnover in early 2023; where other firms replaced it on the DataCentric 'most important' map, these scored more highly in terms of visibility, staff numbers, and subjective factors such as cultural identity and perceived local tradition.

Tourism

That Spain's islands depend hugely on their holiday industry is no surprise, and it seems they are also associated with tourism in the eyes of the public. After all, the Balearic and Canary Islands are some of the top summer break destinations for people living in mainland Spain, not just those from cooler climates in northern Europe.

So, with the Balearics' most profitable company in 2019 being flight firm Air Europa, and its most representative corporation in 2023 being Meliã Hotels, it seems that Spain's easternmost region thrives on visitors from outside.

Energy firms Disa (Santa Cruz de Tenerife) and Endesa (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria) are reportedly the biggest companies in the Canary Islands in financial terms, but the 'most important' in the former, according to DataCentric, is Fred Olsen Express ferries.

This may not be entirely holiday-related, though; passenger ships are the key mode of transport for Canary Islanders who need to get to and from their provincial capital city in Tenerife if they live in La Gomera, La Palma or El Hierro.

For the other Canarian province, made up of the islands of Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, La Graciosa and Gran Canaria – the latter of which is where the capital is based – the 'most important' company is named as HíperDino supermarkets.

Food and groceries

Retail, wholesale and manufacturing of food and drink – which covers everything from wine merchants and distilleries through to supermarkets and restaurants – are hugely represented nationwide as the 'most significant' companies, as they were in the 2019 study revealing the corporations with the biggest turnovers.

Northern Spain is strongly associated with dairy farming, and Asturiana and Río de Galicia milk producers are the main firms in the one-province region of Asturias and with that of Lugo in Galicia.

But the Cantabrian Sea strip is not the only dairy-producing part of Spain: At the opposite end of the mainland, the 'most relevant' company in the province of Granada, in Andalucía, is the milk firm Puleva.

Olive oil is seen as the most representative produce for the province of Córdoba, where the number one company is Deóleo, and in that of Jaén, whose biggest firm is CooSur; the supermarket chain El Jamón (literally, 'The Ham') in the province of Huelva; alcoholic beverages in those of Cádiz and Sevilla (Osborne and Heineken respectively) make Andalucía a key region for food and drink.

Alcoholic drink manufacturing is big business for a significant part of mainland Spain, in fact. Félix Solís wine merchants' in Ciudad Real, southern Castilla-La Mancha, DYC distilleries in Segovia, Castilla y León, and Mahou breweries in Guadalajara, Castilla-La Mancha, to the north-east of Madrid are named as the key corporations for their provinces.

One might have expected the most culturally- and socially-representative firm in the northern region of La Rioja to involve wine, but in fact, its highest-earning company is Cidacos preserves (€270 million per annum), and its most significant corporation, according to DataCentric, is the distance-learning higher education centre UNIR, or La Universidad en Internet ('The Internet University').

Meat producers – Noel Charcutería in the northern Catalunya province of Girona, wholesalers Fribin in the Pyrénéen province of Huesca, Aragón and ElPozo in Murcia on the south-east coast, processed meat retail brand Campofrío in Burgos, Castilla y León – appear to be high-profile corporations nationally.

Other food manufacturers that most represent their provinces are Luengo beans and pulses in León and Cerealto Siro biscuits (pictured above) in Palencia, both in Castilla y León.

As for supermarkets, in addition to HíperDino in Las Palmas and Mercadona in Valencia – whose turnover outstrips that of Ford, the second-most significant company in a province where two of the top three are grocery stores, the other being Consum – the largest in the land-locked Catalunya province of Lleida is the chain store-cum-manufacturer BonÀrea, which has branches throughout the region and also in the Comunidad Valenciana province of Castellón.

Clothing, cosmetics and accessories

Aside from Inditex in A Coruña and Essity in Tarragona, children's fashion and sportswear are strongly associated with their provinces in various parts of mainland Spain.

For Alicante on the east coast, sportswear retailer Sprinter comes out top, and is joined in the same theme by Joma in Toledo, Castilla-La Mancha.

Mayoral childrenswear is the most significant company in the province of Málaga, ahead of Dcoop supermarkets and Unicaja bank.

In cosmetics, Avenida Perfumerías – a national chain – is number one in its founding province of Salamanca, Castilla y León.

Finance and technology

Although Cantabria's most lucrative company is the electricity provider Viesgo Generación, the most 'relevant', and one with a €46.4 billion turnover, is listed as Banco Santander, named after the northern coastal region's capital city.

For Madrid, the top-earning company is still the fuel station giant Repsol, with a turnover of just under €13bn and beating national department store chain El Corte Inglés (€11.4bn), but the corporation said to be most representative of the capital region is telecommunications corporation Telefónica, despite its lower takings (€8.1bn per annum).

A long way down in financial terms but still highly lucrative, La Casa de las Carcasas in the province of Cáceres, in the westernmost region of Extremadura, sells mobile phone accessories and is considered the most relevant in the area.

Industry and transport

In addition to the very high presence of motor manufacturers on the DataCentric map, along with building material suppliers Cosentino and Pamesa and aircraft engineers Airbus, the 'most important company by province' list includes the industrial machinery builders CL Grupo Industrial in Badajoz, Extremadura, and car parts producers Ronal in Teruel, southern Aragón.

For transport, Molinero logistics is the biggest firm in the Castilla y León province of Soria, with around 600 employees on its books.

Cooperatives

Defined as a group or association of companies or holdings which operate as a sole entity, cooperatives might include smaller sellers, producers or consumers – such as livestock or agricultural farmers – who band together voluntarily to benefit from economies of scale.

Members are automatically shareholders or joint owners who all participate in managing the cooperative, and who work as a team rather than as individual traders or businesses.

Several of those operating in Spain are so large that they have become the trademark 'companies' for their provinces.

One of the biggest nationally is the Mondragón cooperative corporation in the Basque province of Guipúzcoa, the capital of which is the film-festival city of San Sebastián. It currently has 281 member firms, including Eroski supermarkets (pictured above), Fagor domestic appliances and Caja Laboral bank, representing a total of 80,821 employees and a turnover of €11.4bn.

A much smaller cooperative, but still the most significant in its province, is Cobadu in Zamora, with a turnover of nearly €302 million and representing 188 employees.

The second-largest in Spain after Mondragón, Cobadu (Cooperativa del Bajo Duero) is made up of individual livestock and arable farmers – approximately 10,800 in total – and was founded in 1982.