Company boss worth £190m still drives old car - as he's too busy to buy new one
The young co-founder of a booming sportswear firm says he still drives the VW Polo he has had for years, despite owning a stake worth £190million.
Tom Beahon, 33, and brother Phil started from their parents’ kitchen in Liverpool seven years ago.
Now their business, Castore, is valued at £750million, with sales forecast to jump 30% to £200million this year.
Not that Tom, who used to play football for Tranmere Rovers, is letting success go to his head.
“I am still the proud owner of a white VW Polo that must be seven, eight years old,” he said. ”I still drive that.
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“I’ve not been on holiday for a while.
“Neither my brother nor I are massively materialistic people.
“We get into the office at 5.30 in the morning and don’t leave until after eight, nine in the evening, so there isn’t a lot of time to buy stuff.
Tom (left) with brother Phil (right) and Andy Murray (PA)“However, it does allow you look after the people that you care about, your family.
“Our mum and dad remortgaged their house when we started the company and that was a big, big deal.
“So we bought them a nice house in a nice area 18 months ago, so I guess it came full circle.”
Castore, whose investors include tennis star Sir Andy Murray and the billionaire brothers who bought Asda, supplies a host of sports teams.
A Castore store in Newcastle (Newcastle Chronicle)In the Premier League, it has deals with Aston Villa, Newcastle United and Wolves, plus Rangers in Scotland.
It also supplies the England cricket team, Harlequins and Saracens rugby, and the McLaren Forumla 1 team.
While being mainly online, it has also opened a string of shops.
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It aims to have 20 UK stores by the summer, with another 15 targeted in the next 12 months.
Joelinton in a Castore-made Newcastle shirt (Newcastle United via Getty Image)Tom explains: “I have always believed that people enjoy the social aspect of shopping, it’s something a lot want to do on a Saturday.
“People can touch and feel and try on the products, and that’s something you can’t replicate online.”
Tom says it wants to be the world’s “number one premium sportswear brand”, taking on the likes of industry giants such as Nike and Adidas.
Tom and Phil, 30, jointly control just over half of the company, giving them a theoretical paper worth of £382million, or £191million each.
The company also has a deal with Aston Villa (Iain Buist/Newcastle Chronicle)It is understood revenues jumped to £115million in the year to this January, with profits leaping to around £21million.
The brothers, who were raised in Bebington, Merseyside, by their science teacher mum Anna and dad Steve who worked in construction, have already turned down a number of takeover offers.
Manchester-based Castore, which has 500 staff, was one of the firms that got a sales boost from the Covid crisis.
“It’s fair to say we were one of the beneficiaries of the pandemic,” Tom explains.
“Because we are an e-commerce retailer, everyone was shopping online, and that benefited us.
“One thing everyone could do during lockdown was go out for their one piece of exercise a day.”
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