Our Story

Don Antonio Regidor was born on November 24, 1891 in Spain. At an early age, he loved to travel back and forth from his native land to the Philippines aboard their family owned ship. When his father died he decided to stay in the Philippines.

In his wandering, he reached Bicol wherein he saw many pili trees. Using the nuts of these trees, instead of the imported ones, as the main ingredient, he tried following his mother’s candy recipes. His first “creations” were the mazapan, yemas, sugar coated, carmelitos, pastillas and pili coated with sesame seeds.

Then in 1936, together with a former Moroccan foreign legionnaire, he pioneered Bicol Region’s thriving pilinut industry by founding a Candy factory, which he called Central Pilinut Candy.

Amidst all these, he married the late Purificacion Macapugay, and they had five children namely Angelita, Estelita, Erlinda, Antonio Jr. and Leticia.

In 1975, he turned over the supervision of the candy factory located at Old Albay District to his daughter Erlinda Regidor-Diaz, who renamed it as Albay Central Pilinut Candy.

In 1985, his granddaughters Rosemarie, Angelica, Elizabeth and Agnes took over, upon the death of their mother Erlinda.

Then in 1996, the Candy Factory became the New Albay Central Pilinut Candy, under the management of Rosemarie Diaz-Battung.

In 2023, Albay Pilinut Candy was handed down to her eldest daughter Audrey Rose Battung-Deocareza.

Don Antonio Regidor was the recipient of the 1971 Panday Pira Award of Excellence. He died on October 16, 1980.