The life and times of Anton Rupert

October 4 marks the centenary of the birth of Anton Edward Rupert, one of South Africa’s most successful business magnates, whose entrepreneurial interest and influence not only extended across almost every sector of our economy and abroad in the latter half of the last century but are also still firmly evident today.

The narrative of Rupert’s career is certainly fascinating, being a true rags-to-riches tale.

Rupert was born in 1916 in the little Karoo town of Graaff-Reinet. He was the eldest son of John Peter Rupert, a practising attorney and respected leader of the predominantly Afrikaner community.

Significantly, his teenage years coincided with the Great Depression, the ripple effects of which reached as far as the Karoo and had a noticeable impact on the Rupert family: while his father’s yearly income had once been an impressive £3 000, in the midst of that global recession, it dropped to a mere £120.

Although the family struggled during that period, Rupert was to learn a valuable lesson about the human character, which became the foundation of his entrepreneurial success: no matter how severe the economic hardship, people will always find money for the little luxuries of cigarettes and alcohol.

Not being able to afford the tuition fees at the universities of Cape Town and the Witwatersrand, Rupert opted to pursue a first-year BSc degree at the University of Pretoria, which, if completed with a good mark, would provide admission to and a bursary for a medical degree at one of the preferred universities. Despite qualifying for admission, Rupert was still unable to afford the fees and thus changed to a straight BSc, with chemistry as his major subject. He graduated in 1936 and registered for an MSc degree in applied chemistry while lecturing part-time to pharmacy students at the Pretoria Technical College. He obtained that degree in 1939 and enrolled for a doctorate while lecturing at the University of Pretoria.

During these formative years, Rupert developed a deep sense of Afrikaner nationalism and railed against what he perceived to be the English domination of the South African economy. In Rupert’s biography, Ebbe Dommisse notes: “Over the next few years, he became increasingly convinced that Afrikaners would have to fight for their own niche in the business world and in public life.”

Such an attitude was evident from the very advent of his entrepreneurial career. The first business venture Rupert embarked on was Chemiese Reinigers, a dry-cleaning business located in the centre of Pretoria, the slogan of which was: A Better, Faster and Exclusively Afrikaans Business.

While not wholly unsuccessful, in 1940, Rupert bowed out of the business (and his doctoral studies) to head up the small business section of the newly established Reddingsdaadbond (RDB), an initiative of prominent Afrikaner intellectuals to dispense funds to suitable applicants who wanted to venture into business. “In this decisive period of his life, Rupert acquired an intimate knowledge of the needs of small-business entrepreneurs,” writes Dommisse.

It was while working for the RDB that, in 1941, Rupert decided to try his entre- preneurial luck again, but this time in the realm of manufacturing. In an interview many years later, Rupert commented: “Production has always fascinated me. Later, at university, I realised how important industry was as a source of employment opportunities.”

He specifically chose the tobacco industry because, as has been stated, he understood that there would always be demand. Thus, on September 21, 1941, with a personal investment of just £10 and the backing of two major Afrikaner investment firms through his connection with the RDB, he formally established tobacco company Voorbrand Tabakmaatskappy. It was this company that would prove to be the foundation of a multinational, billion-dollar empire.

A week later, Rupert married his university sweetheart, Huberte Goote, in a Dutch Reformed church ceremony in Krugersdorp. The couple would have three children: Johann, Hanneli and Antonij.

Over the next four years, Rupert expanded his interests into another depressionproof product: liquor. These interests culminated in the establishment of Distillers Corporation – essentially, a cooperative entity that handled the sales and marketing for a number of Cape wine farmers – on June 11, 1945, with a substantial capital of £1.3-million. (Distillers Corporation would eventually merge with the Stellenbosch farmers’ winery to form the mighty Distell in 2000.)

In the late 1940s, Rupert and his family moved to the old wine farming town of Stellenbosch and it was there that he decided to rebrand his initial business venture under the more affable title of Rembrandt. The company was incorporated in 1948 and produced its first run of cigarettes on June 12 of that year. It listed on the JSE in 1956.

As was the case with the Oppenheimer family through its Anglo American Corporation, from the 1950s, Rupert used Rembrandt as a vehicle through which he amassed interests in a wide array of South African industries, including banking and financial services, mining, printing and packaging, medical services, engineering and food.

Parallel to that local expansion, the company negotiated the acquisition of a number of international tobacco firms. Such interests were eventually consolidated under Rothmans International, which was listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1972.

The growth of Rupert’s empire, however, coincided with the most brutal phase of the apartheid regime. As South Africa became increasingly isolated from the international community, particularly by means of economic sanctions, Rupert was compelled to create a separate international entity to manage its interests in luxury brands, namely Cartier, Montblanc and Dunhill. Consequently, Compagnie Financière Richemont was formed in Switzerland in 1988.

Just two years after the formation of Richemont (and the same year Nelson Mandela was released from prison), Rupert, now aged 72, opted to retire from the active day-to-day management of his empire and handed over the reins to his capable son, Johann.

Interestingly, he remained a moderate cigarette smoker until his death on January 18, 2006, believing that he had to demonstrate some loyalty to the product on which his fortune had been based.

At the time of his death, Rupert’s personal fortune, all of which was founded on a mere £10 investment, was estimated at $1.7-billion.