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The company’s history goes back 90 years...
Pere Girbau Barboso, great grandfather of the present management and a man who was convinced that the future lay in electricity, opened an electromechanical workshop, and thus Girbau was founded. Pere’s son, the fondly-remembered Joan Girbau Vilageliu, built up the business. The workshop manufactured and repaired all kinds of electrical appliances, ranging from radios and x-ray tables, to household washing machines. At the same time a number of Radio Girbau shops were opened, selling household appliances and radio and TV sets.
Our history

The beginning
Fifty years ago, when Pere, Toni and Teresa Girbau had only been working with their father for a short while, they realised that the company’s future lay in manufacturing industrial machinery for laundries.

It was time to face up to their first big challenge - manufacturing their own product. Things had to be organised. Pere would take charge of the marketing side, Teresa human resources, and Toni design and manufacturing. Between them they would manufacture and market the best product: reliable washing machines, with a good technical service and a team of customer-oriented professionals.
25 years

Girbau celebrated the position it had established in the national market for industrial washers. It was now a brand that was recognised nationwide, and the undisputed market leader.

Results were consolidated as a consequence of the major oil crisis. The worst times were now behind them.

The Girbau family had known how to react and had attained the major goal of internationalisation - a task that was far from easy. It called for technological innovation, more design, improved reliability, higher quality, better customer focus and service; and all of this in markets where Girbau was a completely unknown force!

Yet they rose to the challenge, and all together managed to bring about a small yet important revolution: Girbau embraced computerisation, it developed its line of soft-mount washers - machines that few manufacturers in the world had the confidence to make at the time, and the team underwent a major overhaul in all areas: in research, in manufacturing, in sales and in after-sales service.

50 years

There is no longer any doubt that Girbau is a quality brand and a benchmark company worldwide in the washing machine market.

Girbau stands for service, efficiency and innovation. Moreover, it is a sound company with its own history, values and heritage; a company full of names that neither the passage of time nor commercial success can erase; a company that continues to strive to renew itself, to be at the cutting edge of the global market and to be as close to its customers as when it started out.

Girbau recognises the individual work of each member of its team, appreciates their environment, loves its home city and aspires to continue growing and offering greater innovation and a comprehensive service for all its customers, large or small, wherever they might be.

Today Girbau is a company that is ready to take on new challenges, one that is open to new opportunities and determined to continue DISCOVERING THE FUTURE.

Our history