Spain has more bars than any other country in the world, but that’s not the only area where we stand out; we’re also in the top 5 for supermarkets per capita. And among the dozens of food retail brands and companies, there’s one that stands out above the rest (at least in terms of popularity and revenue): Mercadona.
The chain owned by Juan Roig of Valencia is the company with the highest revenue in the entire country, surpassing the multinational Inditex. In 2025, Mercadona reported revenue of nearly 42 billion euros, although profits were “only” about 1.729 billion that fiscal year.
Today, it is a multinational company with 1,672 stores and more than 115,000 employees in Spain and Portugal, but what many people don’t know is that it all began in the 1970s, in a butcher shop in La Pobla de Farnals.
Cárnicas Roig: The Origins of the Mercadona Empire
Francisco Roig Ballester and Trinidad Alfonso Mocholí, a married couple and Juan Roig’s parents, began their journey in l’Horta Nord, more specifically in the hamlet of Poble Nou. They started out in the livestock industry, but their history in meat distribution began when they acquired their first store in La Pobla de Farnals and named it Cárnicas Roig.
In 1977, the couple decided to expand the business into other sectors, convert the butcher shops into grocery stores, and give it a new name: Mercadona. It was in another famous town in the Valencian Huerta region, Tavernes Blanques, where this “new” company was born.
In 1981, Juan Roig, along with his siblings Fernando, Trinidad, and Amparo, and his wife, Hortensia Herrero, acquired the eight stores they owned at the time. Nine years later, the couple bought a majority stake in the company from the rest of the siblings.
The Birth of Hacendado and Its Private-Label Brands
One of the company’s periods of greatest economic growth occurred in 1993, when Mercadona decided to adopt a new strategy: eliminating all sales and promotions to establish the SPB (Always Low Prices) policy. These business guidelines catapulted the company to success and set it apart from other supermarkets.
As a continuation of its strategy and in order to reduce costs, in 1996 Mercadona began creating its own products under the Hacendado, Bosque Verde, Deliplus, and Compy brands. This step forward placed the Valencian company on par with major international supermarket chains and allowed it to exercise greater control over the quality and price of its products.
The next major revolution took place 23 years later with the brand’s international expansion. Juan Roig and Hortensia Herrero opened the first Mercadona outside of Spain (though not too far away) in Canidelo, Portugal.
Since then, the company has continued to grow, innovating with dozens of private-label products each month and testing new supermarket models, most of which already feature a takeout section and spaces to eat inside the store.
This growth brought the company to its peak last year and has made it the largest company in the entire country by revenue. Perhaps Mercadona will expand into more countries by the end of this year, perhaps in 2027, or perhaps much later… it remains to be seen, but what we do know is that it all began in the orchards of Valencia.
