Grup Julià celebrates 90 years of traveling roads for passenger transport. It does so with the forecast of invoicing more than 250 million euros in 2023, after registering 182 million in turnover last year. Thus, the family business will invoice 37% more this year than the previous one, if its forecasts are met.
In this 90-year trajectory, the company, headquartered in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat, has managed to expand and establish itself in more than 20 cities. In them, it employs 1,400 people. It has 12 million international clients, who use a fleet of more than 450 coaches. Specifically, it has a presence in eight countries: Spain, Andorra, the United Kingdom, Italy, Mexico, Argentina, Morocco, and the United States.
Since its foundation in 1933, the company has become one of the main Spanish groups specialized in global tourism and mobility services. It leads the sector despite having had to face difficulties throughout its years of history, which have included the Civil War and the Covid-19 pandemic. The group's president, José Adell, has defended that Julià "has known how to adapt to the new needs of society and a sector in continuous transformation."
For his part, the group's CEO, José Francisco Adell, added that the company has reached this anniversary "positioned as one of the leading companies in the receptive tourism and passenger transport sector, faithful to its foundational challenges." These challenges involve guaranteeing customer safety, offering quality services, and doing so through constant innovation, according to Adell.
The founding of Autocares Julià in 1933 was, curiously, linked to football. Four young people chose to open the company due to the difficulties of teams and their fans in traveling to opposing fields, as was the case in schools and cultural entities when carrying out activities that required travel.
After resuming its activity after interrupting it due to the Civil War, the company positioned itself as a leader in passenger transport in Catalonia. In the 1970s, the tourism boom arrived and, with it, changes in the company, which created various brands for activities such as long-distance holiday travel and corporate travel. The company then also strengthened its presence in Argentina and Mexico.
The second major phase of the group's internationalization arrived with the new century. It created the City Tours tourist coach division, andits international activity also moved to San Francisco, London, Rome, and Tangier.
Historic premises of the Catalan coach company.
The evolution has been maintained over time with operations in recent years, such as the award by the UTE Monbús & Julià of the urban transport line between Sant Boi de Llobregat and Barcelona in 2021. That same year, it joined City Sightseeing and Stagecoach Group, the largest bus operator in the United Kingdom, to achieve leadership in the tourist bus sector of the British capital.