Juan Pablo Martín-Caro founded Pablosky in 1969. But a few decades later, at the end of the last century and the beginning of the current century, their shoes reached the feet of every child in the country. Martín-Caro, which produces children’s and youth shoes and develops its own foot technologyThey were not satisfied with Spain and expanded to other countries in the late 80s.
“Pablosky has been one of the most popular children’s shoe brands among Spanish families for many years. This brand, which has the prestige of a big brand, has turned into many families who want to give Pablosky a gift in the form of children’s shoes. Because “It was a privilege because it was a quality gift” says Jacinto Llorca, author and expert on the fashion industry Retail Law: What management can learn from retail.
This brand knew how to “work very well with positioning at the point of sale.” “Children’s shoe stores that prided themselves on having a good product always had Pablosky on their shelves,” and Pablosky advertisements could be seen in stores, from posters to display cases. “It was a brand that knew how to be close to the consumer.” he continues.
in the 2010s, 30% of international turnover was collected by this Toledo company in the richest region of the Middle EastThey also owned half of the franchise facilities and corners in Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman. Jesús Martín-Caro, the son of Pablosky’s founder, had already stated this in an interview with the magazine. entrepreneurs He said his company’s expansion strategy is based on “being in the right market at the right time.”
“It seemed like that for years leaders in this segment prize children’s shoesbut other very interesting Spanish brands started to emerge that had been doing things very well for a while and with which Pablosky began to compete on the shelves, such as Zapato Feroz or Biomecanics,” says Llorca.
In the process of internationalization, in recent years the family found itself facing two obstacles; decline in sales and competition from countries such as China. The company boasts that it processes the collections by hand in its own facilities. Fuensalida (Toledo) and in Villena (Alicante). “Each shoe may pass through an average of up to 100 different hands during its production,” their website explains. This family-run business will now have fewer staff to inspect shoes. Since November last year, this facility has become the site of the most significant labor conflict in Pablosky’s current history.
Pablosky is here
Last Friday, 48 workers They marched towards the principals’ offices to sign the dismissals. They explained that they were included in the list of works undertaken by the company in the Fuensalida factory. “They were fired in a traumatic way This is what the unions were trying to avoid,” explains Lola Aceituno, Calzados Pablo SLU’s UGT union representative.
Negotiations between the unions and Martín-Caro, chaired by the CEO, Jesus Martin-CaroIt ended on January 4 due to failure to reach an agreement. The owners justified the regulatory filing on economic grounds and threatened to declare bankruptcy; union delegates found this “very rude”.
Unions said earlier this month that ere’s aim was not to guarantee the viability of the factory and its jobs, but to “save on labor costs”. Moving production to Morocco“. Pablosky moved part of its slaughtering and dressing divisions to this country in June 2023. The company declined to respond to questions from El Periódico de España of the Prensa Ibérica group.
María Jesús Fernández, state secretary of CCOO Industria Toledo, announced after the breakdown of negotiations that the Martín-Caro family wants to get rid of about 100 people from a factory that employs 315 people: “They have about 68 employees, almost at pre-retirement and retirement age… 68 in 2025-2026 The person will retire and those positions will never be changed again. “Currently there are more than 100 people between people leaving (48 people) and people retiring.”
How did the layoffs happen?
Starting on Friday, management began searching for employees who would be laid off from that day. The first people to enter the office were 12 of the 19 volunteers. “They left with joy because they didn’t want to be there,” says Lola Aceituno. But after the sandwich, they called out people “who we don’t understand why they were fired.” “It could have been done differently, everyone could have been interviewed and then called one by one. Everyone was called one by one and They did not inform the committee. “We could not be with our colleagues, we could not advise them, we could not accompany them,” this spokesperson reproaches.
Pablosky’s Friday factory was not a company; It was a funeral home with a lot of sadness and a lot of tears. “They looked like lambs going to the slaughterhouse, one after another.”
According to María Jesús Fernández, what Jesús Martín-Caro wants is “to move from a company with 315 workers to a company with 249 workers, that is, SME.”
court battle
The unions state that the company undertook the dismissals “without waiting for the mandatory report of the Labor Inspectorate.” “The compensation they offered was ridiculous.. People who had been with the company for less time left on better terms than those who had been with the company longer. We told them to raise them and at the last minute they raised them 5% more, but that still seems too little for people who have given 40 years of their lives to a company,” Aceituno explains.
Unions some “forced dismissals are invalid“, because they affect workers whom the family has recently had to absorb into the Calzados Pablo SLU workforce after being declared ‘false self-employed’ by the Labor Inspector, with the compensation offered by the Martín-Caro family.