By B. Crawford 

Walk a few blocks from the historic St. Michael the Archangel Cathedral in the center of Orizaba, Mexico, and you will arrive at another historic landmark, the headquarters of Teneria Company. Here, in a one-story, non-descript building, experts combine traditional techniques with the latest technology to transform raw American cattle hides into some of the world’s best quality leather.  

“We have a unique market niche,” Jorge Solis, the president of Teneria Company says, “We are one of the few companies in the world that produces thick leather with a traditional vegetable-tanning process.” 

Jeff Ballard with Thoroughbred Leather was the one who introduced me to Sr. Solis. “It’s located in this nice little town, Orizaba,” Jeff told me when I profiled Thoroughbred Leather for the February 2023 issue of ShopTalk! “I am thinking of retiring there if I can convince my wife.” 

I got one up on you, Jeff. I retired to Mexico a few years ago and married Lulu Monier, a wonderful Mexican citizen. Lulu and I traveled to Orizaba, Mexico, in the mountains of the state of Vera Cruz, to check out Teneria Company. Orizaba is a lovely town: a clean, compact industrial center situated in the mountains about 80 miles inland from the spot on the Gulf Coast where the Spanish first landed Mexico in 1519. Orizaba has good water, fertile soil and hardworking people, who have made the city one of Mexico’s most important industrial centers for the last two centuries.  

Sr. Solis, a straightforward, crisply-dressed businessman entered his unpretentious offices enclosed in a corner of the tannery and introduced us to his son, Adrian, his right-hand man. My Spanish is not the best, but by combining our limited vocabularies with a big dose of enthusiasm, I learned the fascinating story of Teneria Company.   

First of all, the name. “Teneria Company was founded in 1939, by Don Emilio Company,” Sr. Solis explains. “Don Emilio was from Cataluña, Spain. Company was his last name.” Company is a Spanish surname, who knew? 

“We are a modern company that manufactures high-quality leather for the American and European market, made with Mexican hands,” Sr. Solis says. He and Adrian’s most popular products are skirting, latigo, bridle and harness leather. Teneria Company uses vegetable tanning with special greasing and oiling to produce thick leather with exceptional durability and strength. Teneria Company’s client list includes many of the major manufacturers of horse saddles and tack in Mexico, the US and Europe, but its leather has also found a strong market among leather makers crafting belts, leashes and collars for pets, halters and holsters, wallets, bags, totes, briefcases and handbags. 

The Solis family got into the leather business by accident. In 1977, Teneria Company went bankrupt. At the time, Don Alfredo Solis Lara, Sr. Solis’ father, was the president of a steel plant and an advisor to the bank that had a big investment in Teneria Company. “My father was a visionary,” Sr. Solis says. “He saw there was a future in the leather industry, so he invested in the company and brought it back from bankruptcy.”  

The key to the deal was the cooperation of Svend Dohle, a German-born engineer, who was the production manager for Teneria Company and an expert tanner with extensive experience in vegetable tanning.  

“My father made Engineer Dohle a shareholder in the business,” Sr. Solis says. “Dohle did not have any sons and he was eager to pass on his knowledge of tanning leather to another generation.” 

After he finished studying industrial and systems engineering at Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey?(ITESM), one of the leading universities in Mexico, in 1982, Sr. Solis joined his father and Mr. Dohle to work at Teneria. He became Dohle’s best student.  

When Sr. Solis joined Teneria, the company was almost exclusively focused on the tanning of sole leather for the Mexican shoe industry. But as the shoe industry began to use synthetic soles, Sr. Solis started to look for new markets. His search focused on the US, where he knew that vegetable-tanned leathers were widely used to make saddles and tack.    

In 1992, Sr. Solis took some samples of Teneria Company skirting to Harvey Stary of Circle Y in Yoakum, Texas. Stary was impressed by the quality of the leather and Teneria Company made its first American sale.  

“It was not easy at the beginning,” Sr. Solis says. American customers didn’t trust the quality of Mexican tanning but, little by little, American manufacturers began to appreciate the quality of Teneria Company leather as well as its customer service.  

Today, Teneria Company exports most of its products to customers in the US and Europe. In 2004, Jeff Ballard with Tasman Industries traveled to Orizaba to learn more about Teneria Company. Jeff was impressed that Teneria used the same traditional methods of tanning, oiling and processing that were once used by American tanners. Jeff and Sr. Solis entered into a distribution agreement and established a new company, Thoroughbred Leather, which continues to sell Teneria Company leather in the US to this day.  

After our office conversation, Sr. Solis and Adrian took us on a tour of the Teneria tanning plant. First, we watched workers prepping the hides, removing the hair and cutting the hide into two pieces, sides. We then watched workers hang the split hides vertically in large pits filled with natural tannins, where the hides spend a couple of weeks. Workers have to carefully tend to the soaking hides to ensure that the hides fully absorb the tannins in the tanks.  

We watched the workers take the hides from the pits, squeeze out the excess moisture, partially by hand, and shave the hides to the desired thickness. Then they put the hides in drums where they were dyed. Some leather was “hot stuffed,” packed to its core in a vat with waxes and tallows that gives it a rich, smooth feel and great durability.    

We saw workers setting out the leather in frames, where it was left to dry for a few days in a temperature-controlled drying room. After that, the leather is glaze jacked, which gives it a high gloss and shine.  

At this point, the workers finish the leather with waxes, oils and other material to give the leather added protection and meet the needs of various customers.  

The entire tanning process can take up to six weeks depending on the type of leather ordered. The plant stays open 24 hours a day to manage the processing. Twenty-four hours! Lulu and I were exhausted after spending only half an hour in the tannery.  

As if the basic tanning process wasn’t tough enough, Sr. Solis and Adrian have had to face a range of other challenges in recent years. “During COVID,” Sr. Solis says, “we had supply chain problems. Shipping costs went up and we had problems sourcing the vegetable materials we need for tanning.” 

Adrian jumps in. “One product we use is a powder that comes from quebracho.” Quebracho? “It is a hardwood tree that only grows in Argentina, and we use a lot of it. We had a very difficult time getting enough quebracho during COVID.”   

“The other big challenge we face is change,” Sr. Solis adds. “We have to continually improve our processes to deliver a better product for our clients.”  

Thus Ixtaczoquitlán, known as Ixtac, the town next to Orizaba and the site of a new industrial complex. Realizing that he would have to update his production processes in order to meet market demand, Sr. Solis bought land for a new plant in Ixtac in 2006, just down the street from multinational companies such as International Paper. Over the years, Sr. Solis and Adrian have built three large buildings in Ixtac and have begun installing new equipment. They hope to move all their manufacturing into the new facility and combine the best of new technology with top-quality craftsmanship.  

The first thing we saw when we entered the new plant was a line of pallets piled high with hides brought by truck from the US. “We only use American hides,” Adrian says. “They are the only hides we can use to make our products. They are thicker than European hides.” 

Adrian should know. The 34-year-old holds a master’s degree in tanning from the Universidad Politecnica de Cataluña in Spain. “When I told the people in Spain about our product, they were amazed. For them it was an artisanal product. The Europeans only make products that use thin leather, for clothes and car seats, and they don’t know much about vegetable tanning.” 

Adrian is a bachelor who enjoys cars and absorbs information about the leather business like hides soak up tannins. “I was terrible in school. I hated sitting in front of a computer. I fell asleep,” Adrian admits. He woke up when he got into the leather business. “I was fascinated by taking a piece of raw hide and turning it into a finished product. It was like magic for me.”  

As we walk past new leather-processing equipment imported from Italy and Spain, Sr. Solis tells us a bit more about his family. “I have been married for 25 years to Josefina (Pini) Lagunes. Pini is a wonderful wife who has helped me a lot professionally and personally.” Pini and Sr. Solis have two sons in addition to Adrian. Thirty-two-year-old Jorge works in sales and shipping at Teneria, while 30-year-old Rodrigo works in the family steel business as plant manager.  

Heading up a company that works 24 hours per day, Sr. Solis doesn’t have much time to relax, but when he does, he enjoys grilling steaks with family friends and the occasional round of golf. “I love to watch F1 races, and once a year I go on vacation with my wife to some city or country we have never been to before.”  

Walking through their new facility, Sr. Solis proudly points out where new equipment will be installed. The most impressive area of the plant is a production line that dies, dries, cuts and packs hides all in a single line. “The work will still require a tremendous amount of hand labor and attention to detail, but we will be able to deliver a much wider range of products in a much quicker time by incorporating new equipment and centralizing our production.” 

In addition to streamlining production, the new plant will also allow Teneria to meet the environmental production standards required by US and European governments. “All the water from our tannery is directly connected to a water treatment plant to minimize the impact on the environment. We are also co-founders of the Water Treatment Plant of Ixtaczoquitlán’s Industrial City. This plant ensures that development and operation always reach the highest levels of efficiency to maintain environmental balance and reduction in water consumption.” 

When I ask Sr. Solis more generally about the key to a successful business, he pauses. “You have to be honest with your suppliers, your clients and yourself. If you don’t know something, you have to admit it and work with someone who knows more than you do.”  

Over the years, clients have delivered a lot of challenges to Teneria Company. One client asked Teneria to make waterproof leather for tractor trailer brakes. For many years, Teneria has supplied the raw material for American firefighters’ helmets, which are traditionally made from thick leather. “We got a call from a client who said they were using our product on Yellowstone,” Adrian says. Indeed, the hats worn by many of the actors on the popular western television show wear hats that are lined with a thin strap made by Teneria Company. 

Sr. Solis and Adrian had a particular thrill in May 2021. “Jeff Ballard called us and told us that the famous horse trainer Bob Baffert uses tack made from Teneria Company leather, and that his horse Medina Spirit had just won the Kentucky Derby.” Teneria Company in the winner’s circle. How fitting. 

Tanning in the U.S. is the opposite of a prestige job. It is hard work performed in a punishing environment. The leather industry has grown in Mexico largely because of skills of Mexican tanners, who combine an excellent worth ethic with modern production techniques, while maintaining important aspects of the artisanal process. Ninety-five of the 115 employees at Teneria are directly employed in production, and Sr. Solis takes pride in treating his workers well. 

“Juan Alvarez, who is in charge of our night shift, has been working for Teneria for two years longer than I have,” Sr. Solis says, “and I have been working here for 41 years.” 

  As my wife and I step out of Teneria’s modern integrated leather manufacturing facility, Sr. Solis proudly points out the site of his future corporate offices and takes a minute to reflect. 

“Our slogan is quite simple,” Sr. Solis says. “Nothing replaces leather.”  

Not then. Not now. Not ever. 

teneriacompany.com 

tel. Mexico 52 272 725 07 01 

Many thanks to Jeff Ballard with Thoroughbred Leather for his help with this article.  thoroughbredleather.com