This is the youngest billionaire you never heard of...
He was a pizza boy who built Gymshark into a $1.3B company with only $500.
His strategy was so simple but GENIUS that Nike, Puma and Adidas executives couldn't believe it.
Here's the full story: 🧵
In 2012, Ben Francis was delivering pizzas and studying business in college.
But between deliveries, he was obsessed with something:
The massive gap in the fitness apparel market that Nike, Adidas, and Puma couldn't see.
At just 19, Ben would:
• Deliver pizzas until 9PM
• Work on his sewing machine until 4AM
• Study business during the day
• Repeat
His first "office"? His mom's garage, where he hand-sewed bodybuilding clothes.
His startup capital: £500.
Barely enough for:
• A sewing machine
• Some basic fabric
• A screen printer
• Website hosting
But Ben had one advantage the giants didn't: He understood fitness culture was changing.
The big breakthrough?
While Nike and Adidas fought for celebrity athletes, Ben noticed a new type of influencer emerging:
Fitness YouTubers with massive, engaged audiences but zero brand deals.
No one was paying attention to them. Yet.
Ben's genius move:
He sent free Gymshark clothes to these rising YouTube stars when they had just 50-100K subscribers.
Cost per influencer? About £30.
The ROI? Astronomical.
When these YouTubers blew up to millions of subscribers months later, they were already loyal to Gymshark.
The big brands couldn't understand it:
How was this 20-year-old kid building more brand loyalty than their million-dollar campaigns?
2013: First fitness expo
Revenue: £250K
Ben and his team borrowed money for a booth at a bodybuilding expo.
They were terrified no one would show up.
Reality? The booth was MOBBED.
Thousands of fans lined up to meet their favorite fitness YouTubers - all wearing Gymshark.
The entire inventory sold out in 90 minutes.
But success brought problems:
2015: Black Friday sale disaster
• Website crashed
• £100,000s in lost sales
• Angry customers
• Brand reputation at risk
Ben was devastated.
His response?
Instead of hiding, he posted a raw, emotional video apologizing to customers.
The honesty worked. Customers stayed loyal.
Ben learned: In the social media age, authenticity beats corporate perfection.
---11
The scaling strategy was brilliant:
1. Target micro-influencers before they blow up
2. Build authentic relationships, not just transactions
3. Create artificial scarcity with limited drops
4. Focus on community over corporate branding
5. Stay ridiculously close to customer feedback
We put a lot of research and work into this thread before reading it.🙏 🚨
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