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Meet Anna Kasprzak, the 29-year-old billionaire heiress to the ECCO shoe empire and one of the richest millennials in the worldhttps://www.businessinsider.in/miscellaneous/meet-anna-kasprzak-the-29-year-old-billionaire-heiress-to-the-ecco-shoe-empire-and-one-of-the-richest-millennials-in-the-world/slidelist/71284741.cms2019-09-25T00:48:44+05:30

Meet Anna Kasprzak, the 29-year-old billionaire heiress to the ECCO shoe empire and one of the richest millennials in the world

Sep 25, 2019, 00:48 IST

Anna Kasprzak is one of the richest billionaires under 30 years old, according to Forbes.

Her $1 billion fortune comes mostly from her partial ownership of ECCO — a shoe company based in Denmark.

Kasprzak's grandfather, Karl Toosbuy, started the company in 1963.

Toosbuy was a shoemaker by trade and managed a shoe factory in Copenhagen by the time he was in his early 30s.

He wanted his own company, so in 1962 Karl and his wife Birte took out an ad in Jyllands-Posten — a newspaper in Denmark — asking, "Who wants us?" They were looking for some business partners.

By 1963, the company was fully established — they were able to hire 74 employees in the year following.

The company has since grown drastically — it expanded into the US market in 1994, when it was named Footwear Company of the Year.

Today, the ECCO company makes around $1.46 billion in sales, according to Forbes.

Kasprzak is part owner of the company — along with her mother Hanni Toosbuy Kasprzak and brother André Kasprzak — but running the business isn't her full-time job.

The heiress is actually a professional horseback rider. She competes in a sport called dressage riding where the goal is for the rider to train the horse to respond to subtle commands.

She is part of the Danish national team, which allows her to travel internationally for competitions ...

... and she has also attended 12 Olympic Games.

Kasprzak has not yet medaled in the Olympics, but she has had success at other tournaments and dressage events like the CHIO Aachen in 2017. Also in 2017, her national team took home the silver medal at the FEI European Championships.

Kasprzak also runs a private dressage barn in Haderslev, Denmark. Some of the horses at the barn are already trained and have been competing with Kasprzak, while others are still being "educated."

"These horses are top athletes, and if we want to deliver results, we need horses that are healthy and strong — physically as well as mentally," Kasprzak said. "I take great pride in working with this dimension of the sport."

Her website also says the team at Kasprzak Dressage believes no two horses are alike. "I spend a lot of time getting to know my horses and understanding their personalities," she said.

Kasprzak and her brother seem to share a love of sports. He was a professional golfer, according to Forbes, and joined the ECCO board in 2017 — their mother is the chairman of the supervisory board.

Kasprzak is a mother herself — her daughter was born in the spring of 2018.

While not much is known about the rider, aside from her athletic profession and involvement with her barn ...

... we do know that her inheritance has placed her among the top 8 billionaires under 30.

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