Liliane Bettencourt

Liliane Bettencourt

Liliane Bettencourt is the nineteenth richest person in the world, with an estimated net worth of $22.9 billion USD. But there are more categories in which to hold a distinction! She is the richest woman in the world, and the second-richest person in France. The world knows her as the non-executive director and major shareholder of L'Oréal, the world's largest cosmetics company.

Liliane Bettencourt was born October 21, 1922, in Paris, France. She is the only child of Eugène Schueller, the founder of L'Oréal. Tragically, her mother died when she was only five years old. She is a very private person who has been shy about the press, so not much is known of her childhood.

Her father, Eugene Schueller, got his start in the cosmetics business in 1907, when he developed an innovative hair-color formula which he called 'Auréale'. He started business by selling batches of the formula to local hairdressers. He registered his business in 1909, declaring the purpose to be "research and innovation in the interest of beauty". The company's original name was the "Société Française de Teintures Inoffensives pour Cheveux", later shortened to L'Oréal.

By the 1920's, the company had employed three chemists full-time, and the number grew to 200 by 1950, 1,000 by 1984, and around 2,000 today. The company has also branched out into other cleansing, cosmetic, and beauty products, eventually expanding into today's line of over 500 brands and several thousand individual products. L'Oréal sells products both to retailers and to beauty professionals.

Liliane Bettencourt married André Bettencourt, a French politician, in 1950. The couple set up house-keeping in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, where they remained until André's death in 2007. Now widowed, Liliane Bettencourt has an only child: a daughter named Françoise Bettencourt-Meyers, who now also is a member of L'Oréal's board of directors.

Liliane Bettencourt inherited both the family company and her father's fortune as the sole heir in 1957. Today, she controlls just over 27% of the company's interest, the food company Nestlé controls 25%, and the rest is in publicly traded stock. Her chief usage of her inherited wealth is to found the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation, which awards the "Liliane Bettencourt Prize for Life Sciences" to European researchers annually. Otherwise, her guidance of the company is largely delegated, while she makes sure that things are still run the way her father ran them.

L'Oréal and Nestlé have moved more and more into a partnership in recent years. Laboratoires Inneov, a joint venture between the two companies, is an exploration of the nutritional cosmetics market. Another joint venture between the two companies is Galderma, which deals in dermatology. L'Oréal also has a 10% interest in Sanofi-Aventis, the world's third-largest and Europe's largest pharmaceutical company.

L'Oréal throughout the years has become a name synonymous with glamour and fame, in part because of their aggressive marketing campaign employing fashion models, actors, actresses, singers, and sport figures. Their commercial motto "Because you're worth it." is instantly recognizable anywhere in the world. However, the company has had many criticisms. Primarily the animal-rights activists have loudly protested the use of animals in research and testing. Also, being heavily involved in the fashion industry, L'Oréal has naturally been the topic of a catty tell-all book or two.
L'Oréal has established itself as a cosmetic brand which is going to be around for quite some time. The success of the company was well-ensured by Eugene Schueller's dedication to innovation and research. While Liliane Bettencourt's main "secret to success" appears to be "be born in the right family", she has nevertheless done an impressive job of maintaining the company for over 50 years, something no mere passive heiress could have done.