Covadonga O’Shea - The Man from Zara. The story of the genius behind the Inditex group

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La Esfera de los Libros, S.L., 2008.

Original title: As es Amancio Ortega, el hombre que creo Zara

Covadonga O'Shea, 2008

LID Publishing Ltd. 2012

Printed in Great Britain by T J International Ltd.

ISBN: 978-1-907794-20-9

Collection editor: Jeanne Bracken

Translation: Don Topley

Editing: Laurie Price

Cover design: Irene Lorenzo

Typesetting: SyS Alberquilla S.L.

First edition: March 2012

Covadonga OShea walked into my office in the School of Fashion at Parsons in New York exuding style and fierce intelligence. Chic, elegant and sophisticated it was immediately clear this was a woman Parsons wanted to work with. Since then, we have met many times including when she invited me to speak at ISEM the MBA school that she leads in Madrid. On each occasion my respect for her and her perspective on this glorious global fashion industry has grown. So it is only natural that the hitherto closed world of Zara has been opened up for her to chronicle.

Many years earlier, when I worked as a fashion designer in London, an important stop on our Parisian research trips was always the Zara store near LOpera in Paris. We needed to see how Zara had interpreted key trends. We were used to seeing the full seasons offers from other stores, but somehow Zara always surprised us. Colleagues visiting the store a couple of weeks later would see completely different stock. We marvelled at how quickly the store changed.

Many people question the quick turn around of a new seasons colours or silhouettes or hem-lines. But without the transient nature of fashion trends, garment inspectors in India, shop assistants in England, tech designers in the USA, window dressers in Spain, knitters in Thailand, sewing machinists in Mexico and tens of millions of others in fashion related jobs around the world would not be working.

Of course fashion is also a lot of fun. For a consumer choosing a fabulous new party dress, to a designer creating a striking new look, there is a basic social need being fulfilled, the need to look and feel good.

In this book, Covadonga OShea delves into the origins of Zara, how the company evolved into the global fashion player we know today and crucially how it still manages to react so quickly to trends around the world. And while there is a necessary debate about the sustainability of fast fashion, there is also the fact that thanks to companies like Zara, millions of people who cannot afford couture can still look and feel good.

There is much to learn from Zaras story and Covadonga OShea brings a highly informed and intelligent perspective to it.

Simon Collins

Dean. School of Fashion

Parsons the New School for Design

New York City

I am indebted to a large number of people for their help with the publication of this book.

First and foremost, of course, is the protagonist, Amancio Ortega himself, who, over a period of a number of years, little by little revealed hidden corners of his personality and his work which, despite his resistance, opened the door to his permission to set down what he tells in these pages.

He is then followed by a long list of people who work or who have worked at Inditex, whose opinions and stories have helped me portray the man and his company with the greatest possible precision. My warmest gratitude to each and every one of them. It would be impossible here to include every single name, but let me assure you all that not a single name has been forgotten.

And my thanks, yet again, go to secretaries Raquel, Maribel and Carmen who, with their endless patience and efforts, far exceeding the call of duty, have been invaluable allies.

And many thanks to the current President of Inditex, Pablo Isla, who provided me with the utmost support to help me succeed in allowing the world to know something of the person who is Amancio Ortega, the founder of this organisation. He never failed to urge me to keep going and he spent a great deal of time reading through this document so that I should enjoy peace of mind in the knowledge that everything was in order.

And last but not least, I thank LID Publishing for bringing this keenly awaited and much needed version in English to the market.

Madrid, November 2011

It never occurred to me to write this book until suddenly, one day I realised that not only did I want to write it, but that I was under a compulsion to sit down at the computer and set about telling the world into which Amancio Ortegas business has exploded so spectacularly. This is everything I have been lucky enough to learn about this man through my meetings with him. He is just a man, yet he became so much more because of his absolute candour. Because of Amancio Ortegas passion for anonymity he has defended his privacy against attempts by others to destroy it. He has completely and unintentionally become an almost mythical figure in the world of business, yet he has undoubtedly made history in spite of his desire to remain anonymous.

Endless tales have been told about him, none with any foundation, and his true personality is still unknown. The business schools that head up the international rankings of those aspiring to be experts examine his career and all of those who have spoken to him even just one time act as though he were an old acquaintance. The most they can really boast about is that they might have shaken hands with him once.

You will not find me making any absurd claims here, such as that I am one of Amancios close circle of friends or colleagues who he deals with on a daily basis; but I do consider myself rather privileged because since the outset of our relationship we have spent quite a lot of time in contact. I have been able to talk with him about almost anything at all, just as an exchange of views between two professionals who happen to be passionate about their work. He was already a groundbreaker in his field, en route to achieve the greatest business success in the 20th century in the field of fashion. My own field, fronting the magazine Telva, a pioneer in the world of womens national publications, could also make claims to having conquered a market that was beginning to fill up with competitors keen to control the national product.

Were we united by a common vision of the future and an almost blind faith in what was in our hands? Leaving aside all our differences, I do not have the slightest doubt that something along those lines must have taken place for that initial trust, now over a quarter of a century old, to have persisted over the years and not lose an iota of its closeness and brilliance.

I met Amancio Ortega on December the first 1990, when I was invited to visit Inditex (Industries in Design in Textiles), a large textile business located in the outskirts of La Corua, a province in northwest Spain. At that time the name of the small industrial zone way up there in Finisterre, Arteixo (the outskirts of La Corua), was hardly known at all. These days it is talked about on five continents. When I landed, as has been the case every time I visited, a car was waiting for me in the airport. I was then taken to what was Zaras general headquarters at the time, near the magnificent building that was built years later in the same Sabn zone. I came to chat with the founder of a textile business that was just beginning to attract a great deal of attention, and I was taking the opportunity to have a look at the plant.