The billionaire count in the UK is falling and Hull kitchen king Malcolm Healey is among those in the drop zone, according to The Sunday Times Rich List 2025.
Published online on Friday, May 16 (and in the print edition of the newspaper on Sunday, May 18), the list is the definitive guide to wealth in the UK. It charts the fortunes of the 350 richest people in the UK and is based on identifiable wealth, including land, property, other assets such as art and racehorses, or significant shares in publicly quoted companies.
Mr Healey and family this year appear in fourth place in the tabled top ten wealthiest in the North, with a reported wealth for 2025 of £901m – a fall of £600m on last year when their amassed fortune was reported to be £1.501bn. The wealth figure places the Healeys in 170th place overall in the national rankings.
In 2024, Mr Healey – the man behind interiors giant Wren Kitchens – and family were officially the richest people in the Yorkshire and Humber region. This year, the North is dominated by Portaloo pioneers the Shepherd family, of York, whose amassed wealth is £1.350bn – a climb of £246m over last year’s figure.
Wren Kitchens is Mr Healey’s third successful kitchen outfit, which two years ago also moved into fitted bedrooms. He and his late brother, Eddie, the man behind Meadowhall, came from humble Hull beginnings.
With barely a school qualification between them, they nevertheless managed to influence the shopping experience for many across the globe. The Healeys became a permanent fixture on The Sunday Times Rich List but have continued to shun the limelight.
Mr Healey, who will be 81 in June, previously sold Hygena Kitchens for £200m and its US equivalent Mills Pride for £800m. In 2023, the Healeys sold online electrical retailer eBuyer to two British investors for an undisclosed sum.
Robert Watts, compiler of The Sunday Times Rich List, said: “The Sunday Times Rich List is changing. Our billionaire count is down and the combined wealth of those who feature in our research is falling.
“We are also finding fewer of the world’s super rich are coming to live in the UK. This year we were also struck by the strength of criticism for Rachel Reeves’s Treasury.
“We expected the abolition of non-dom status would anger affluent people from overseas but home-grown young tech entrepreneurs and those running centuries-old family firms are also warning of serious consequences to a range of tax changes unveiled in last October’s Budget. Our research continues to find a wide variety of self-made entrepreneurs building fortunes not just from artificial intelligence, video games and new technologies but also mundane, everyday items such as makeup, radiators and jogging bottoms.
“We know many of our readers find these people and their stories inspiring – especially the many who had tough starts or setbacks to their lives and careers.” Just behind the Shepherds are retailers Lord Kirkham and family, who claim second position in the North with their unchanging wealth of £1.140bn.
Despite his poor O-level results foiling Lord Kirkham’s plans to be an RAF pilot, he took on making furniture and built DFS into the brand it is. His fortune figure moves him up one place in the table from last year.
Third in the region are Andrea Shelley, William Morrison and Eleanor Kernighan and family, whose inherited fortune is a “no change” £933m. The 76-page special edition of The Sunday Times Magazine reveals the largest fall in the billionaire count in the guide’s 37-year history, from a peak of 177 in 2022 to 156 this year.
The number of billionaires has dropped for three successive years – this year’s decline is the sharpest yet. This year’s list of 350 individuals and families together hold combined wealth of £772.8bn, a sum that is 3 per cent down on last year but still larger than the annual GDP of Switzerland, the country hosting this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.
Sir Elton John, Lord Lloyd-Webber, Sir Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Euan Blair, Sir Lewis Hamilton and Sir Christopher Nolan all appear in the annual survey. The combined wealth in the 37th annual edition is £772.8 billion — a sum larger than the annual GDP of Switzerland.
The minimum entry level flatlines at £350m, another indicator of a subdued year, said the compilers of the list.
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