About us

The business in the 1960s

The Spitaler company in Lana has an old tradition in the shoemaking trade, dating back to 1842. In the distant year of 1933, Johann Spitaler began his internship in Val Gardena after completing his master craftsman's training, making his first contacts in shoe sales. With modest means in the midst of the crisis-ridden 1930s, Johann Spitaler began the adventure: shoe sales with small offers. The positive economic developments, especially the emerging tourism, enabled a steady upward trend. After several small adaptations of the shop, a larger reconstruction of the entire house took place in 1962. This resulted in a very attractive and modern shoe shop with large shop windows for the time.

After the reconstruction in the 1980s

After graduating from the commercial college in Merano in 1971, son Norbert attended the European Educational Forum of the Shoe Trade in Pirmasens (Palatinate/Germany) and graduated with a diploma. Afterwards, he put what he had learned into practice, especially in the field of shop fitting, and equipped the shop with customer-friendly pre-selection shelves. In 1985, the OHG was founded together with his wife Brigitte and already in 1987, they ventured a new challenge, namely the demolition and new construction of the entire shop, which was reopened on 2 September 1988 after only 11 months of construction time. The shoe store with its 300 sqm salesroom now presents itself in clearly arranged departments on the ground floor, as well as a mountain and hiking shoe salesroom in the basement with repair service. Already in the 5th generation, son Tobias has joined the OHG after attending a number of specialist seminars and training courses abroad in addition to his IT training and is now part of the management team. In July 2015, it was decided to transform the OHG into a KG and to transfer the company management to the son Tobias as Spitaler Tobias KG.