Ben Francis MBE started his online gymwear company with his university friend at the age of just 19 in 2012. Through the well-trodden path of business trial and error, imaginative marketing, and a solid business model, he is now valued at around £1.5bn. And all on the back of his favourite pastime - a gym workout.

Platinum looks at the rise of an entrepreneur who was awarded in the Kin’gs New Year’s Honours List when he was merely 31.

Benjamin Francis was born in the West Midlands in 1992 and grew up in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire. He first became interested in computing after studying IT at school. His first business was an online company that sold, of all things, car number plates. In his recreation time, Francis started going to the gym as a teenager. He later said, “The structure, consistency and work ethic I found in the gym I realised, could be applied to different areas of my life and it would work.” 

Francis is a car and motorcycle enthusiast and a season ticket holder at Aston Villa. He married his girlfriend Robin Gallant in 2021, and they have three children together.

He enrolled at Aston University in 2010 to study international business and management, where he built a “strong foundation on which to build a business.” However, he dropped out in 2012 to focus on his fledgling business, while continuing to learn business management away from the university environment.

Before launching Gymshark, Francis developed two fitness applications, Fat Loss Abs Guide and iPhysique. While at university between 2010 and 2013, he worked for Pizza Hut as a delivery boy, earning about five pounds an hour. He left six months after launching Gymshark.

In 2012, while still a teenager, he launched Gymshark in his parents’ garage with school friend Lewis Morgan. The website initially sold fitness supplements. Unable to afford to buy stock or secure distribution deals with supplement suppliers, he began dropshipping supplies from other vendors, and it took him six weeks to make his first sale.

In 2013, branching out from supplements, Francis began designing and selling fitness apparel on Gymshark’s website. He manufactured products from his parents’ garage in Bromsgrove using a sewing machine and a screen printer he’d bought for £1,000 from his savings. His grandmother had taught him how to sew.

Gymshark’s first public appearance was at the BodyPower fitness trade show in Birmingham in that same year. After the trade show ended, a tracksuit went viral on social media, generating £30,000 in sales within 30 minutes. Francis subsequently left university and his job at Pizza Hut to focus on Gymshark full-time. As a start-up, Francis marketed the brand through partnering with social media influencers, including body builders Nikki Blackketter and Lex Griffin. Gymshark was one of the first brands to extensively use social media influencers.

In the intervening time, certain social media influencers have become a law unto themselves, with many stories appearing of how they would expect freebies from a given company or establishment in return for good copy. The issue that irritates businesspeople and the public alike is that some then seek to effectively blackmail the company with a bad review if their selfish needs aren’t met.

This culture clearly came from the United States, though several British social media influencers are more than happy to follow suit, oblivious to the fact that UK business culture doesn’t operate the same way, leaving them usually looking self-entitled and foolish.

However, when it works - as it did with Gymshark - it’s a brilliant marketing tool that is effective as it is cost-efficient.

In 2015, Francis stepped down as CEO of the company to become chief marketing officer, chief brand officer and chief product officer. At the time, he said the move would allow the company “to grow even more quickly” and give him time to “work on my weaknesses and become a more rounded businessperson”. 

The following year, Morgan partially exited the business, retaining 20% of the company, to focus on his other ventures, property development company Ernest Cole and fashion label Maniere De Voir. The company opened a new 8,000 square foot office in Hong Kong in 2019, while in September that year, Gymshark launched the Gymshark Lifting Club, a gym and innovation hub, on the same site as its headquarters in Solihull.

Since 2016, Gymshark has been listed on The Sunday Times Fast Track of fast-growing private companies. The company currently sells products in 131 countries.

In August 2020, Gymshark sold a 21% stake to US private equity firm General Atlantic in a deal that valued the company at over £1 billion. As Francis currently owns more than 70% of the company, his personal wealth was valued at around £700 million at the time.

In a blog he wrote the following month, he stated, “I cannot believe I’m writing this, but Gymshark is worth $1.45 billion.”

“It’s a weird feeling because ultimately, what we’ve just done is sign off as having Gymshark as a billion-plus dollar brand, which is out of this world. It was only eight years ago, pretty much to the day, that I was hand-sewing, hand-making, and hand-printing products. I was hand packaging them, putting them into a bag and carrying them down to the Post Office, standing and waiting whilst each parcel was stamped and sent out across the world.

“To go from that to a billion-dollar brand is just insane. I’m actually now realising just how far we’ve come. We’ve come from hand stitching product to a billion-dollar brand! I’m so happy with how far we’ve come, but I’m so much more excited about how much further we’ve got to go.”

He returned to the role of the company’s CEO the following year. In February 2023, Gymshark appointed bodybuilder and influencer David Laid as creative director.

Today, Gymshark’s headquarters are at Blythe Valley Park in Solihull, West Midlands. The company also has an office in London, and a North American office in Denver. It opened its first store on Regent Street in London in October 2022. This was followed by stores at Westfield Stratford City and White City. The first non-London store, at the Trafford Centre in Greater Manchester, opened in July 2025.

Business model

Gymshark sells fitness apparel for men and women, including workout vests, hoodies, t-shirts and leggings. While the brand was initially aimed at men, by 2020, approximately two-thirds of sales were to women.

The company does not rely heavily on brick-and-mortar stores, though it does have some UK shops in London and Manchester.

In August 2019, Gymshark released a fitness app offering both free and premium plans. The app provides a range of workouts, video demonstrations and customizable training plans. The home-based workouts gained popularity during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

Gymshark has partnered with social media influencers. As of 2020, the company was paying 125 influencers to market the brand on on social media platforms. It also has several partnerships across the gym industry.

Gymshark publishes annual sustainability reports under the banner “Our Planet”, outlining its goals for reducing carbon emissions and improving product circularity. The company introduced recycled fabrics in selected ranges and switched to biodegradable packaging for online orders.

In 2024, Gymshark announced a target to achieve net-zero operational emissions by 2030. The company also supports community campaigns, such as the “Conditioning Community” project, which promotes inclusive access to physical fitness programmes across the UK.

Public relations

In 2024, Gymshark named bodybuilder and social media superstar Chris Bumstead, aka CBUM, as a new shareholder. “We’re beyond excited to welcome Chris to Gymshark, as both an athlete and a part-owner,” commented Noel Mack, Chief Brand Officer at the time. The announcement came as the six-time Olympia winner retired from competitive bodybuilding and began to think about life beyond the stage.

However, as with any successful business, there will always be bumps in the road, whether due to less-than-ideal business strategy decisions or individuals outside the business demanding a piece of the action. In late 2023, American influencer Alix Earle alleged that Gymshark prematurely terminated a promotional partnership after she expressed pro-Israel views on social media.

Earle claimed in filings to the High Court that Gymshark had agreed to pay her US$ 1m for promotional content, including TikTok and Instagram posts, an event appearance, and a photo shoot. She argued that the agreement was ended early due to negative responses online to her stance. For its part, Gymshark denied that a binding contract existed.

In the end, the two parties settled out of court, but it’s a scenario that brings a nasty taste to the mouth, no matter which side of the argument one decides to settle on.

Gymshark has also faced disputes with former brand ambassadors over restrictive contractual clauses. In 2023, British powerlifter Nathaniel Massiah, who had been an influencer for the company since age 17, began promoting a rival brand during a non-compete period. Massiah’s legal team contended that the contract and proceedings were brought to a close.

Once again, in early 2025, they settled the dispute out of court, with concessions on both sides.

Accolades

In 2018, Francis was included on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list. In 2019, he served on the UK Government’s Business Council for Entrepreneurs. In 2020, he was awarded the EY UK Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Francis was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2023 New Year Honours for services to the business sector at the age of 31.

While the figures can never be considered totally accurate to the last penny, today, Ben Francis MBE is considered to be worth around £1.3 billion. Given the current valuation of the company, his continuing 70% stake in Gymshark makes him one of the UK’s youngest billionaires, having reached unicorn status well before he turned 30.

In his own words

“Regarding retail, I’ve long held the belief that the best global brands in the next decade will be purpose-led, community-first brands that clearly define their values and position in the world. In the past, the growth model for high-street brands was centred around mass production and distribution, often through third-party retailers, resulting in broad product ranges lacking purpose.”