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Espinaler

Vilassar de Mar, Catalonia, Spain✓ verified

Espinaler is a Catalan house founded in 1896 as a vermouth tavern in Vilassar de Mar; its canned-sardine line began in the 1970s and today spans a wide range of oil, spicy, tomato, escabeche, and xeito-method sardines.

At a glance

Country	Spain
Region	Catalonia
City	Vilassar de Mar
Founded	1896 Founded 1896 by Miquel Riera y Prat as a wine-and-vermouth tavern in Vilassar de Mar; the canned-seafood line was launched decades later, in the 1970s, by Miquel Tapias Roldós, who traveled to Galicia to personally select the sardines and shellfish.
Company	Family-owned Catalan vermouth-and-conservas house (Tapias family, 5th generation)
Price	$$$

Notable facts

Founded 1896 in Vilassar de Mar, Catalonia, as a wine-and-vermouth tavern by Miquel Riera y Prat.
Canned-seafood production began in the 1970s under Miquel Tapias Roldós, who sourced sardines and shellfish directly from Galicia.
Now run by the fifth generation of the founding family (David and Miki Tapias).
Famous beyond sardines for its aperitif 'salsa Espinaler.'
Sardine range spans three tiers — Premium (including Xeito-method), Classic, and the budget Pepus line — plus an organic/ecológico olive-oil sardinilla.
No dedicated press/media kit page was found on espinaler.com; the company does publish a full downloadable product catalog PDF (see sources) listing every SKU with codes and case counts.

Origin

Espinaler started in 1896 not as a cannery but as a wine-and-vermouth tavern in Vilassar de Mar, opened by Miquel Riera y Prat. The family business survived wartime hardship under his daughter Francisca in the 1930s, was rebuilt into a serious vermouth distributor by Joan Tapias Riera in 1946, and got its signature condiment when Ventureta Roldós formulated the now-iconic "salsa Espinaler" in 1952. The move into canned seafood came in the 1970s, when Miquel Tapias Roldós began traveling to Galicia to hand-select sardines and shellfish — a line that expanded nationally from 2000 onward. Espinaler is now run by David and Miki Tapias, the fifth generation of the founding family.

The current sardine range runs from a Pepus budget line in vegetable oil, through a Classic line (plain, spicy, tomato, and escabeche, all in the small 3/5-count format), up to a Premium line that includes an organic olive-oil sardinilla and a Xeito-method tin referencing the traditional Galician sardine-net fishing technique.