The curious history of the Messi Pharmacy of El Clot

BarcelonaOn Carrer València, in the Clot neighborhood, there is a pharmacy that sparks unusual curiosity. The sign –Messi Pharmacy– is not a commercial claim or a reference to the Argentine footballer. It is simply the surname of its owner, Cristian Darío Messi. He bought the business in 2019 and, continuing the family tradition, named it as his father had already done in Argentina. The coincidence, however, means that many customers who walk through the door cannot resist the temptation to ask about the establishment's connection to Leo Messi.

A family surname

Cristian Messi is Argentine, specifically from Río Tercero, a city in the province of Córdoba. His family has a distant relationship with Leo Messi's, explains Cristian to the newspaper ARA. "It turns out the great-grandparents were cousins, my great-grandfather was a cousin of Leo's great-grandfather." At home, they have always taken this kinship for granted and the story has been passed down for generations.

The pharmacy, however, was not opened by Cristian from scratch; he bought a business that already existed and gave it his last name. Before managing to have his own establishment, he had worked as a pharmacist and substitute in different pharmacies in Catalonia. When he had the opportunity to buy one, he found a space in El Clot that fit what he was looking for. "It's a place where people know each other, very neighborhood-like," he explains. From then on, the name of the pharmacy began to arouse a curiosity that goes far beyond the regular customers.

The name also has a more practical effect. Cristian explains that there are people who find the pharmacy through the internet and call to ask about specific products. "People find us because the name catches their attention. They search on the internet and call me to ask if we have certain products." It happens to him especially with cosmetic products.

The meeting of the Messis

Cristian and Leo Messi have met in person once. It was at Madrid airport, when both were returning from Argentina, before Cristian owned the pharmacy in El Clot. Upon seeing him, he approached to greet him and introduced himself. “I gave him a brief summary of our apparent family relationship. He was aware of the story of his great-grandfather,” recalls Cristian.

The meeting, however, was brief. Leo was surrounded by people approaching him to ask for photographs and, according to Cristian, his wife even commented to him afterwards that perhaps the footballer hadn’t paid much attention to him. He, on the other hand, highlights another detail. “With the amount of people stopping him to ask for photos, I thanked him for the time he spent talking to me”.

Cristian also recalls that Leo made a gesture that caught his attention during that wait at the airport. Despite the number of people approaching him, he attended to everyone who asked him for photographs. It is one of the reasons why, despite admitting that he is not particularly a football fan, he has a good opinion of the Argentine striker. “He seemed like a good man to me, a very approachable person with people,” he opines.

Beyond the pharmacy

The surname Messi has also generated curious situations for him far from the pharmacy. A few weeks ago, during a stay at a retreat house in Llinars, Cristian started talking to a man who didn't know him at all. "In the middle of the conversation he told me: 'You look like Messi'," he recalls. His response was to show him his ID card. "When I showed him my ID, he was stunned."

What made that situation special is that the man in question didn't know who Cristian was or that his name was Messi. "He hadn't seen the pharmacy, he didn't know my name or anything." Until then, when someone had told him that he looked like the footballer, Cristian had attributed it to the fact that they already knew his surname. "I always thought they told me that because they knew my name was Messi. It's the first time it has happened to me like this."

In El Clot, on the other hand, the surname has been part of the neighbourhood for years. Cristian explains that some tourists enter the pharmacy to ask him if he has any connection with Leo Messi, while others stop in front of the sign and take photos of it. "I'm already used to it," he acknowledges. For him, it is simply his surname, but it is inevitable that it awakens interest among the people passing by.