Ortega family

The Ortega family is one of the wealthiest in Spain due to their ownership position in Inditex, the world’s largest clothing group. Their flagship property is Zara although the group owns seven other brands including Zara Home, Massimo Dutti, Bershka, Oysho, Pull and Bear, Stradivarius and Uterqüe. The Ortegas entered the clothing industry as a family when husband and wife Amancio Ortega and Rosalia Mera began making and selling their own clothes from home. They opened their first Zara store in 1975 and built the business together for its first decade. The couple divorced in 1986 and Ortega married his second wife Flora in 2001. Unlike other billionaires who crave the limelight, Ortega is so intent on maintaining privacy, up until 1999, no photograph of him had ever been published. Rosalia Mera passed away in 2013 and left her share of the family fortune to their daughter Sandra Ortega Mera. That inheritance made her the second wealthiest person in Spain behind only her father. She owns a 4.5 per cent stake in Inditex, is not involved in the running of the operation. Instead, she focusses her attention on Fundación Paideia, the non-profit founded by her mother that supports vocational training for people with disabilities. In 2018, Ortega was estimated to have a net worth of $70 billion, making him the wealthiest retailer in the world.