Lunch with the FT: Les Wexner, the Man Behind Victoria’s Secret
Over iced tea and salad in his Ohio offices, he discusses the secrets of his retail philosophy and the ‘emotion’ in lingerie
By Barney Jopson
There was a time when Les Wexner, a shopkeeper in dowdy Columbus, Ohio, would slip out from his clothing store to sit down for a burger at lunch. He was en route to becoming a billionaire, the man who would revolutionise women’s underwear with Victoria’s Secret and end up as the longest-serving chief executive in the Fortune 500. But he did not know that back then, and sensed that something in his life was missing.
It was the 1970s and Wexner was opening more and more stores but feeling unfulfilled. People would assure him that he was a big success. “You have no idea,” he would reply. To quell the angst, Wexner decided he needed a purpose beyond work. He began carving out a few hours each week for extracurricular projects. But that meant sacrificing time somewhere else. So Wexner trained himself to eat less. He stopped going out to lunch. “I had a dog,” he says, explaining his inspiration. “I fed the dog once a day.”
Wexner has aged into an elfin 80-year-old and he tells me the story to assuage any disappointment. I have just walked into a…
