Pasta master Pastas Romero

Long-established family-owned pasta manufacturer Pastas Romero specialises in creating 100 per cent natural pasta in various shapes and flavours for food businesses across Europe and, increasingly, worldwide. Emma-Jane Batey spoke to export manager Nacho Santisteve to learn more.

PASTA MASTER

Founded in Daroca, Spain in 1926 by D. Manuel Romero Marques, Pastas Alimenticias Romero SA has gained nearly 90 years of knowledge and experience in the artisanal production of dried pasta. Consistent growth and development has seen the company become one of the Spanish food industry’s leading players, with a key position across Europe. Today, Pastas Romero exports to nearly 30 countries worldwide, following a strategic decision to push its products abroad in the early 1990s.

Export manager Nacho Santisteve spoke to Industry Europe to explain how the company’s solid family history gives it an excellent foundation from which to grow. Mr Santisteve said, “As a family business with nearly 90 years of expertise in pasta making, we have a business that I am very proud to work for; we have fast decision making, a delicious product range and a reliable quality and service that our customers really appreciate. We have a production capacity of 300,000 kilos a day and we produce a variety of shapes and flavours of pasta – all created with our customers’ requirements in mind.”

Utilising its modern production facilities covering a total area of 75,000 square metres, Pastas Romero develops and manufactures pasta types including egg pasta, 100 per cent wheat Durum semolina pasta, a range of low humidity pasta (dehydrated), quick cook pasta. It is also Spain’s largest producer of organic pasta, a sector which is enjoying considerable growth. Mr Santisteve continued, “Organic pasta is a rapidly growing sector and we’re finding that it is a particularly interesting product for producers of ready meals. We work with a number of large-scale European pro-

ducers of ready meals and have developed various organic pasta shapes that are in accordance with what our customers know the consumer wants. As a company with many years of experience and a family-owned structure that lets us quickly respond to our customers, we’ve found that we can always meet whatever challenges our customers face through using our facilities, our skills and our knowledge.”

Artisan and automated

Operating six fully-automated production lines, three for short pasta, two for long pasta and one for speciality pasta, Pastas Romero uses state-of-the-art technology as well as high quality ingredients to produce its goods. As the first company in the Spanish food industry to gain the ISO 9000 quality assurance, it also holds a number of other quality and environmental certificates including ISO 14001, IFS (at higher level) and ISO 22000. Mr Santisteve added, “It’s a wonderful mix. We are located in the beautiful area of Daroca which is very close to where the best quality Durum wheat is grown and transformed into semolina, so we are neighbours with a number of the most important semolina manufacturers in Spain. This is the main ingredient in our pastas and we are passionate about using the best to keep our ‘Superior Quality’ mark according to strict Spanish technical and health regulations.” Romero is a shareholder in two of the top semolina producers.

Pastas Romero also offers a number of flavoured pastas, all made with 100 per cent natural ingredients. With no additives, artificial colouring or flavourings added to any of its products, the speciality pastas offered include spinach, tomato and squid ink pasta as well as egg pasta made with pasteurised egg. Mr Santisteve noted, “As we manufacture our pasta at high temperatures and with a low water content, our natural products have a best-before date of up to three years. Everything we make is subject to very strict quality control testing and we operate a centralised Quality Department in our modern factory with its own laboratory. It is here we are focused on constant improvement across our facilities.”

Delicious growth

Pastas Romero’s product portfolio is regularly expanding. Its latest offer includes new lines of products made of whole wheat or different shapes for children one of them is the family Simpson (a 20th Century Fox license), special bronze dye pasta and, new colours like red beet pasta. It has a great deal of flexibility and an expert team to quickly develop ‘tailor made’ recipes out of the standard products for new demands or projects.

As Pastas Romero continues to grow through working with food producers worldwide, the company is expanding its production facilities. Mr Santisteve concluded, “We are more than ready to meet the demands of our customers wherever they are in the world. We are experienced in exporting pasta products, in developing innovative pasta products and in using our unrivalled knowledge of delicious pasta with only natural ingredients. We are very excited about the future as we see many opportunities across our business, from organic pasta for ready meals to flavoured pasta and bulk pasta for food producers.” n