Meet Denmark's Newest, Youngest Fashion Billionaire

Danish fashion executive Anders Holch Povlsen is the latest billionaire to join Forbes’ worldwide ranks. At age 40, he is also one of the youngest in the world.

Danish Billionaire Anders Holch Povlsen

Holch Povlsen of Denmark took over his family’s fashion retailer at age 28. He is now the CEO and sole owner of Bestseller, the $3.2 billion (sales) fashion player, which sells apparel and accessories to women, men, teenagers and children in 46 markets in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Canada. The company markets the items under 10 brand names, including Mamalicious, Name It and Vera Moda, and employs 12,100, one fourth of whom are in Denmark.

Anders’ parents, Troels Holch Povlsen and Merete Bech Povlsen, opened the family’s first store in 1975 in the small Danish town of Ringkobing. The couple are still involved in the business – Merete is its chairman and Troels sits on the board – but they gave up ownership to Anders, possibly in 2012. Though the company website says the business is family owned, a spokesperson confirmed that Anders, the eldest of their two sons, is the sole owner, with a 100% stake. He would not provide any more details or specifics, citing the family’s desire for privacy.

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Forbes figures the company is worth at least $1.8 billion, based on a multiple of its earnings, which declined 48% in the latest fiscal year to $210 million. The family also has an interest, along with two Danish partners in China, in Bestseller Fashion Group China, an independent company that designs its own collections for approximately 5,000 stores in China.

Anders, who is married with three children, has been getting attention lately for a series of land purchases in the Scottish Highlands. One British paper, The Telegraph, estimated that he now owns 120,000 acres, making him one of the Highlands’ biggest landowners behind the Prince of Wales, British billionaire Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor, better known as the Duke of Westminster, and a few others.