Career
Wiese is worth $3.1 billion and is the Executive Director of South African retail giant Shoprite (JSE: SHP). Other known accomplishments in Christoffel's career includes being a chairman of Invicta Holdings Limited (but without executive powers) starting in 2006. Wiese has become the 11th most successful businessman in his chosen fields of industry (accounting, banking, finance, consumer goods, fashion, and retail) and the 69th most successful person in South African history.
Under his leadership, Shoprite started out as a chain of eight supermarkets in Cape Town that was purchased for 1 million Rand (equivalent to $122,000 USD) which eventually blossomed into the multi-billion dollar business status it enjoys today thanks to various acquisitions and innovative expansion strategies made in the first 30 years of operations. After playing a role in helping Shoprite acquire distributor Senta, Wiese started expanding his business into franchising new locations for Shoprite department stores. He also purchased the struggling OK Bazaars from South African Breweries for one rand in 1997; inserting 157 supermarkets and 146 furniture stores to the company and adding jobs to the area. In 2011, Wiese's Shoprite stores were considered to be the sixth overall favourite brand, with a third most valued brand in terms of community upliftment in South Africa. In addition to Shoprite, Christoffel owns more than 1200 corporate outlets under various names. Shares of Shoprite have skyrocketed by 50% on the South African national stock market from March 2011 to March 2012; leading to Wiese making a hefty $1.5 billion profit.
He is legally the 44% owner of Pepkor since becoming the chairman there in 1981 and starting out as a executive director for the retail store Pep from 1967 to 1973. Pepkor is a discount store in South Africa that was founded in 1965. A private game reserve in the Kalahari Desert and the prestigious wine producer - the Lourensford Estate - are some of the properties that Wiese owns.