We grew up in a tiny terraced house & worked at our father’s garage as kids – now we’re worth £5BILLION & run Asda
TWO brothers who started life in a tiny terraced home went on to become the billionaire owners of Asda.
The Issa brothers, Mohsin, 51, and Zuber, 50, would spend their days cleaning toilets at dad Vali’s Blackburn garage.
But it was there where they had the light bulb moment to turn dull forecourts into “shopping destinations”.
From a young age the brothers were entrepreneurs, with Mohsin founding plastic bag company Europlast in 1993 alongside brother Zakir.
They say they learnt their business ways from dad Vali and mum Zubera, Indian immigrants who moved to Lancashire to work in the textile industry.
In 2001, Mohsin and Zuber decided to put their dreams into reality by buying a rundown forecourt on Brandlesholme Road in Bury for £150,000.
Euro Garages was born and from there it just grew and grew, buying up forecourts across the country.
By 2016, the Issas joined forces with private equity group TDR – selling a stake in their business for £700 million.
The move saw them merge with another chain of petrol stations.
It was at this point the brothers went into overdrive, incorporating fast-food joints like KFC and Burger King into their filling stations.
By February 2018, Euro Garages announced they would acquire 762 convenience stores.
In 2021 they gobbled up Asda for £6.8 billion, becoming majority shareholders alongside US retail giant Walmart.
And by 2022, turnover at EG Group had lurched by 25 per cent to £27.5 billion.
The brothers have since expanded their EG Group forecourt empire overseas – employing more than 50,000 people across the UK, Europe, America and Australia in over 6,000 forecourts.
The brothers — who live next door to each other in Blackburn — also own healthy fast-food chain Leon and tried to buy Caffe Nero.
But the Lancashire lads – now worth £5.05 billion – insist they have never strayed far from their roots.
Though they they did snap up a £25 million mansion in London’s exclusive Knightsbridge.
Speaking to the Financial Times in 2020, Zuber said: “People are always asking when we will move to London or Manchester.
“But the quality of life here is great. A lot of people do a few years in London then come to the northwest.
“We have got a lot of fantastic people that way.”