Forever21 Founders Do Won And Jin Sook Chang
Building a successful business from scratch is always an impressive achievement. Doing it with your partner and supporting each other during the tough times while raising a family is just showing off.
That is the story of Do Won and Jin Sook Chang, who founded the fashion retailer Forever21 back in 1984 in Los Angeles.
At the company’s peak in 2015, the couple was worth nearly $6 billion as they were operating out of 600 stores with 30,000 employees.
However, in 2020 disaster struck as the company filed for bankruptcy wiping billions of dollars from their finances as the entrepreneurs are now “only” worth $1.6 billion.
The South Korean immigrants have faced harder challenges than that of the recent bankruptcy as when they moved to California in the early 1980s, they lived from pay-check to pay-check just trying to make ends meet.
Thirty-six years later, they have built a multi-billion dollar brand and have raised two daughters, Esther and Linda, who are already demonstrating their parent’s entrepreneurial spirit.