The long-distance races that Edorta Juaristi (San Sebastián, 1972) is fond of will surely have helped her in her task at the helm of Caprabo, the distribution company founded in 1959 in Catalonia owned 50% by Eroski and the Czech group EP . When he accepted the position of general director of the brand, he could not imagine what was to come. It was February 2020 and, after 21 years assuming different responsibilities within the Basque group – he started in the operations area and became vice president of the Eroski S.Coop Governing Council – he decided to take the plunge. A few days after saying yes to the new position, the pandemic began. “I joined as CEO in June of that year and it has been my biggest professional challenge by far; At first I felt a bit dizzy, because it is a company with 64 years of history and deeply rooted in Catalonia”, he recalls.
Thus began another particular marathon, the one that the mass consumption sector has experienced ever since. First, deal with the consequences of the covid crisis, with supermarkets identified as essential services; then the war in Ukraine, which started with an unbridled demand for sunflower oil –there were shortages in numerous stores due to the high demand and prices skyrocketed–; and finally, the inflationary spiral of food that has put supermarkets in the eye of the hurricane.
In the midst of all this maelstrom, Juaristi has promoted Caprabo's largest transformation and competitiveness plan. “It has been one challenge after another, with a lot of action since I arrived and situations that require quick decision-making... and I like this; the welcome and the experience could not have been better”, he comments. Activity has not been lacking. Under his direction, the new platform for fresh products in the ZAL has been launched, the new Caprabo headquarters has been inaugurated, the new e-commerce platform and the transformation plan for the entire network of stores has been completed –in the last four years they have invested one hundred million euros. He has also managed the shareholding change with the entry of EP Corporate Group.
Despite everything, of all her tasks, visiting the stores is the one she enjoys the most. “I consider myself a store man, I love stepping on them, seeing what happens, talking to the team…it's something that caught my eye from distribution,” she says. And one of the reasons why, after graduating in Economics and obtaining a postgraduate degree in Distribution Business Management, he switched from banking to mass consumption. It is so important to know first-hand what happens in Caprabo's shops that in the first two weeks of August he visited 64 of them.
The arrival at the management of the company has also meant an important life change for Juaristi. “Without the support and effort of my family, none of this would have been possible,” he remarks. From Monday to Friday he lives in Barcelona and on weekends he returns to the Basque Country, where his wife and his three children remain. To maintain contact during the week, they use technology: "Every day we have dinner together by video call."
In summer, she will barely rest for a couple of weeks, and she will do so at her family home, as her daughter has to train for an important sports competition. He will continue to go running for an hour every day, perhaps to face his next challenge: to participate in the Barcelona marathon and lower his last mark, 2.57 hours. He will also dedicate some time to the cinema, another of his great hobbies.
Already in September, back in Barcelona, he will begin to prepare for Caprabo's next financial year, with the opening of more of his own stores among the objectives. "These last few years and inflation have helped us to improve efficiency, we have gained customers and sales -743.6 million in billing in 2022- and now it is time to continue transforming Caprabo". In the ultra-competitive Catalan distribution market “you can't sit still; It is not enough to be good, you have to be the best”.
