The American magazine "Forbes" published its annual ranking of the world's richest in 2023, and included Ben Francis, 30, a British national, with a net worth of $ 1.2 billion.

Ben Francis is known as one of Britain's most famous young self-taught people, having worked as a pizza delivery as a child, and then decided to start a sportswear startup called Gymshark in 2012, at the age of 19 at the time.

Forbes published a detailed report on Ben Francis' life story, written by Giacomo Tugnini, in which he recounted how the young man in his thirties went from a former pizza delivery man to a billionaire and owner of one of the world's largest sportswear retailers.

Ben Francis made his first company's clothes in his parents' garage in Birmingham, and he was a fan of sports, especially football, and dreamed of becoming a top player, but at the age of 15 he realized he would not be a professional player.

His thinking turned to weightlifting when he was 16 years old, and he wanted to increase his muscle capacity and gain more self-confidence.

After almost a year, he got excellent results and a great transformation in his body and fitness, which was a major shift in his personality and in his academic and life career.

University and pizza orders

In 2012, Ben Francis was a full-time college student during the day and a pizzeria delivery man in the evenings.

"I used to wake up and go to Aston University in Birmingham, and after I finished school I would go to work at a branch of the Pizza Hut restaurant chain from five to ten in the evening. I would respond to emails about Geshark between pizza deliveries, then go home and follow up on the company's website, and design new products."

The Beginning

After two years of painstaking work, when his fledgling company had impressively reached a quarter of a million pounds a year, Ben Francis said goodbye to both the pizza world and the university to focus his efforts on his company.

Because of his passion for fitness and app creation, Ben Francis wanted to create a fitness mobile app, and he also created a fitness website named after his company, Geshark, and sold supplements on the site.

After about a year, he thought about making some of the sportswear that his friends wanted at the gym, and learned from his grandmother how to use a sewing machine, and then decided to sell these clothes on the website he founded earlier, and soon people started buying these clothes and they liked them greatly.

CNBC published another report by Vicky McIver about how Ben Francis brought his startup into the unicorn club, meaning billionaires.

The headquarters of the sportswear company Geshark is currently valued at $ 1.45 billion (social media)

Going Global

Ben Francis decided to join a trade show dedicated to everything bodybuilders and coaches needed, and he never expected the impressive results of selling sportswear, as he could not manufacture the huge amount of clothing that was ordered of him alone.

Ben Francis understood the lesson well and decided to market through world celebrities, YouTube, and even in bodybuilding and weightlifting, and realized that they could give him a big advantage, so he sent samples of his products and followed what is known as "celebrity marketing." He sought to hire these celebrities to be sponsors of his brand and benefit their audience immensely.

As sales grew, Ben Francis decided he needed someone with management experience and shouldered the burden, and Ben Steve Hoyt was appointed CEO three years after it was founded in exchange for a small stake in the shares.

This allowed him to ensure that things were going right in the company and free him to think ahead and travel the world to promote products and participate in events and trade shows.

The value of gymnastic company Geshark at the end of 2021 was estimated at $ 1.45 billion. The company sells in about 180 countries around the world, and the number of employees of the company has reached more than 500 employees, and the number of followers of the company on Instagram to more than 5.5 million followers, and nearly two million on Facebook.