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FROM a stall in a Barcelona street market, Isak Andic has stretched his Mango fashion chain around the world - including an outlet in Bahrain's Seef Mall - and the company is now planning to spend BD408 million in doubling its turnover.
Mango has established itself in the malls with the help of Spanish siren Penelope Cruz. The 'Madonna of Madrid' is part of a gaggle of celebrities ranging from Liz Hurley to Lauren Hutton the Spanish chain hires to grab fashion column inches.
The glamorous faces in its advertising campaigns are far better known than its mercurial, Turkish-born founder, Isak Andic, who emigrated to Spain when he was 13 and started selling T-shirts to fellow students at Barcelona's American High School.
The young entrepreneur - worth an estimated BD1 billion today - soon progressed to running a wholesale business, selling clothes in a Barcelona street market, but realised there was more money in retail and opened the first Mango store in the city in 1984.
Like Inditex, the company behind Zara, the retailer has expanded rapidly to 1,000 stores in 90 countries. Mango's main role is clothing design, and to that end it employs an army of twenty-something women at its sprawling Barcelona headquarters.
The average Mango employee is 28 and its wealthy owner, now 53, is so keen to keep Mango young and dynamic that no one says usted - the formal Spanish 'you' - even when addressing him.
Mango's global store network is fed by hi-tech logistics centres sending out 30,000 items an hour. The retailer generates annual sales of BD750 million.
This year Andic revealed plans to invest EUR760m in expansion over the next four years. In that time he expects to double both the size of the chain and its turnover with new stores and concessions planned.
Mango is also seeking to widen its customer appeal, hiring 'It girl' model Alice Dellal to appeal to fashionable youngsters while also running a campaign featuring 64-year-old former supermodel Lauren Hutton to encourage women of all ages to wear the brand.
