Since the early nineteenth century, the Spanish textile industry has been concentrated in Catalonia. Though an established industry, it lacked the dynamism of many of the newer industries and had the least impressive growth rate among Spain's manufacturing industries. It was an industry that suffered from excessive fragmentation, and, although its operations were export-based, it depended on a protected domestic market. Spain's entry into the EC removed tariff barriers to textile imports, and the industry generally found itself in difficulty. Foreign investors showed little interest in the Spanish textile industry, and in the late 1980s it was being subjected to extensive industrial modernization for greater efficiency.

The Spanish shoe-manufacturing industry was concentrated chiefly in the Valencia area and in the Balearic Islands. According to a Spanish government study, 90 percent of the country's 2,100 shoe factories had fewer than 50 employees, and a large part of the industry operated in the underground economy.

Data as of December 1988