Zara co-founder and Spain’s richest woman dies

Rosalía Mera, who died last week aged 69

Rosalía Mera – co-founder of Spanish clothing giants Zara and Spain’s richest woman – has died at the age of 69.

Mera’s death was confirmed via a statement issued by Inditex, the company that owns Zara, last week. Although the statement declined to mention the cause of death, Spanish media has reported that Mera had a stroke while holidaying on Menorca, and died at a hospital in La Coruña on August 15…

From seamstress to tycoon, Mera’s story bears all the hallmarks of the classic rags-to-riches tale. She left school at 11 and spent her teenage years working as a seamstress. Then, in 1975, she founded the first Zara store with her then-husband, Armancio Ortega, who is now the world’s third-richest person. 

After shying away from the proposed name of Zorba due to the location of a nearby bar of the same name, they changed the letters to spell out Zara and the rest, as they say, is history.

Adopting a business model of replicating high-end fashions with low-priced versions, Zara quickly established itself as one of the most popular clothing stores in Spain.

In recent decades, the company’s growth has been phenomenal, with Zara stores prominent in most cities around the world. Globally, there are currently 1,763 Zara stores.

Forbes magazine ranked Mera’s wealth at $6.1bn, which made her the 195th richest person in the world, and the wealthiest ‘self-made woman’.

Mera was famously outspoken on a number of political issues, with her left-leaning outlook leading her to lock horns on occasion with various centre-right Spanish prime ministers. Most recently, she opposed Mariano Rajoy’s Conservative government’s plans to revise the current abortion laws, saying that the law (which allows 16-year-olds to get an abortion without parental consent) is “fine as it is.”

Inditex’s statement on Mera’s death read: “The group wishes to send its sincere condolences to her loved ones and friends at this extremely difficult time, after the loss of a person who contributed so much to the origins and development of the company.”