In 1975, Spanish tailor Amancio Ortega was taking a walk with a girlfriend. They passed by a shop where Ortega saw a beautiful peignoir. It was incredibly expensive, which made Ortega think about making his own exquisite but inexpensive underwear. Today the secret of Zara’s success lies in fast fashion and using tons of data to predict trends. Interestingly, even the scandal between King Juan Carlos I of Spain and Hugo Chávez in 2007 was helpful to the business: Zara printed a million T-shirts with the famous "Why don’t you shut up?" by the King.

Today Amancio Ortega is number 4 on the Forbes list of richest people.