There are two types of millionaires, those who share their lives with the public, like Elon Musk, and those who prefer to remain discreet, almost to the point of anonymity, like the French Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, heiress to the L’Oréal cosmetic empire.
Those who know her describe her as a woman of few words, shy, reserved and even sullen. With a personality contrary to that of her mother Liliane Bettencourt, daughter of Eugène Schueller, the man who built her empire on hair dye, shortly before the Second World War began.
It is said that Françoise spends between two and three hours playing the piano, as it is the activity with which she normally starts her day. She then dedicated herself to reading and writing, one of her greatest vocations. She likes a quiet life at home, a modern building located in Neuilly-sur-Seine, the most exclusive area of Italy and located on the border with France. A space that her friends and family have described as “the residence of an intellectual.”
She has written several books on Greek mythology and the relationship between Christians and Jews, the two topics to which she has dedicated the most her studies and to which she took refuge, while her family’s fortune grew and they would make her the richest woman at 70. years. According to Bloomberg magazine, last December, she amassed a fortune of $100 billion and is just one place away from entering the top ten of Forbes’ billionaires.
She was born in 1953, she is the only child of André and Liliane Bettencourt, and due to her family’s great fortune, throughout her childhood she was always protected by a group of bodyguards, who took her to and from school or university, because of the fear that was always in her parents that they could kidnap her.
His grandfather Eugène Schueller, of German descent, was born in Paris in 1881, studied Chemistry, and after several years of testing and studying at home, looking for an innovative idea, created the first non-toxic hair dye. In this way, he founded L’Oréal in 1909. With his death in 1957, her only heir Lilianne Henriette Charlotte Schueller, Françoise’s mother, was left in charge of the company and inherited a fortune estimated at $32 billion.
But her mother, like her, did not want to take over the management of the company, so she delegated the position to a childhood friend of her husband, the conservative politician André Bettencourt, to dedicate herself to a life of extravagance and parties. Her daughter never wanted to join them and this distanced them for a moment, since they both had a very different character.
Her mother always liked to look glamorous, while she preferred discreet and dark clothing, and she has always kept it hidden behind large thick black glasses and without much makeup, with few public appearances.
However, none of this seems to matter to him, because he prefers to lead a simple life, away from the spotlight and opulence, until his mother dies in 2017 and he has to take a place on the board of directors of L’Oréal, since he is its largest shareholder, and a couple of years before his death his figure hit the front pages with the scandal that his family was involved in, known as the ‘Bettencourt affair’.
A family network that began with the appearance of the photographer François-Marie Banier, in his mother’s life, after he was hired by the French magazine Egoiste to take some photographs of Liliane Bettencourt, and there was an immediate click between the two. Liliane liked Banier’s impetus, her self-confidence and her insolence, because they made her laugh a lot.
While his daughter Françoise, on the other hand, found him an unpleasant guy. She asked her mother to stop seeing him, but she didn’t want to, so they stayed away from her for a long time. It is said that after each meeting, the photographer always left with a check in his hands or a Piccaso.
So it would be his daughter who would be in charge of bringing everything to light, when she made the decision to sue François-Marie Banier. As the investigations progressed, they discovered that he would have received more than one billion euros.
In the end, the court sentenced this man to a couple of years in prison, but with his defense’s appeal to this sentence, he only had to pay a handsome compensation, and Françoise remained as her mother’s guardian until her death. Over the years they made peace, until they were able to reconcile.
Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, the heiress to the L’Oréal cosmetics empire, is the richest woman in the world. Photo: AFP.