In 2012, Ben Francis, a pizza delivery boy, and 19-year-old college student, began making his training clothing. He is now among the youngest billionaires in the world, thanks to Gymshark’s quick, social media-driven expansion. Ben Francis, the youngest billionaire in the UK, went from beginning a business to becoming one in just 11 years. Gymshark first sold vitamins through dropshipping before switching to athletic wear.
After establishing a firm just 11 years prior. The 30-year-old founder, who built the Gymshark brand while attending college and working as a pizza delivery driver, is one of the youngest billionaires in the world and the youngest in the U.K.
The billionaire’s path to founding one of the most well-known fitness businesses in the world began when he was still a student at Aston University, where he developed the original version of the Gymshark website.
According to Entrepreneur, which reported the young founder’s success, the company’s initial activities focused on dropshipping sales of supplements. Francis, however, discovered there was a lack of comfortable workout wear and the company decided to go a different path.
The revelation motivated the businessperson to launch a line of clothes that mixed European tapering styles with American bodybuilding attire. Over the next two years, Francis individually produced the goods with the aid of his grandmother, using a sewing machine and a screen printer.
In August 2021, he once more assumed leadership as CEO. Francis has made it clear that he has lofty ambitions for Gymshark, among them being the British equivalent of sportswear giants like Nike, Lululemon, Under Armour, Adidas, and Puma. He also believes that the business may expand internationally, with North America eventually accounting for half of its revenue.
With the release of the Gymshark Conditioning App, Gymshark has already gone beyond clothes and has aspirations to create more interactive items.