From button sellor to Gold Group International

As a small, skinny, undernourished fifteen-year-old David Gold had dreams of playing for his local football club, West Ham United. To his huge distress his father Godfrey blocked his way in doing so, but the entrepreneurial businessman is now the charismatic chairman of Birmingham City football club. Along with younger brother Ralph he owns Gold Group International, one of the most profitable private businesses in the United Kingdom. It is the parent company of retailer Ann Summers, lingerie chain Knickerbox, executive jet charter company Gold Air International, and the brothers share ownership with David Sullivan in Sport Newspapers. In May 2005 he bought the oldest Surviving FA Cup trophy for almost half a million pounds at auction to prevent it going to Germany. In 2005, the Gold Family were place 92 on the Sunday Times Rich List with a wealth of £500 million. This is the remarkable story of Mr Gold who started out helping his mother sell buttons from a stall outside their house, moving indoors to convert their front room into a card and sweet shop, from there, he went on to run a bookstore in Charing Cross, and before long branched out into publishing, printing and distribution. Keep wathcing this space to learn more about Mr David Gold, our businessman for September.