Dirk Rossmann

Dirk Rossmann
Born	1946 Germany
Occupation(s)	Entrepreneur, author
Known for	Founder of Rossmann drugstore chain
Notable work	"... dann bin ich auf den Baum geklettert!" Über Aufstieg, Mut und Wandel (2018); Der neunte Arm des Oktopus (2021)

Dirk Rossmann (born in 1946) is a German entrepreneur and author, recognized as the founder of Rossmann, which stands as Germany's second-largest drugstore chain. As of April 2024, his estimated net worth was approximately US$4.5 billion.

In 1972, he introduced Germany’s pioneering self-service drugstore.

Early life

Rossmann was raised in Germany. His parents, Bernhard Roßmann (1910–1958) and Hilde, née Wilkens, managed a small family-owned drugstore near Hanover for two generations. Following his father’s premature passing, his mother liquidated assets to sustain the business. Rossmann later described their situation as impoverished and living under difficult conditions. At the age of twelve, he began earning income by selling discounted pharmaceutical products. He also discovered that his biological father was Theodor Kayser (1899–1968), a neighbor and son of an industrialist from Warsaw. After completing secondary education, Rossmann trained professionally as a druggist and started working in his family’s store from 1962, while his elder brother continued with academic studies.

Career

At just 25 years old in 1972, he established Rossmann. During the 1980s, he sold a 40% share of the company to Hannover Finanz; this stake was subsequently transferred to the Dutch Kruidvat Group, which itself was acquired in 2004 by the A.S. Watson Group, part of Hong Kong’s Hutchison Whampoa conglomerate.

By 2020, Rossmann operated 2,196 outlets across Germany, placing it second only to DM. After expanding into Eastern Europe following the early 1990s collapse of the "Iron Curtain," the company managed over 1,000 stores in that region by 2009. Across Europe, Rossmann maintained a total of 4,088 shops and employed around 33,400 staff in Germany and approximately 56,200 worldwide. In 2019, its German revenue reached €7 billion with a growth of 5.1%, while group-wide sales totaled €10 billion.

Forbes valued Rossmann’s fortune at about US$2.7 billion in 2016 and estimated his net worth at US$4.1 billion as of November 2019.

Personal life

He is married to Alice Schardt-Rossmann, with whom he has two children, and the family lives in Lower Saxony, Germany. Both of their sons pursued studies in business administration and actively participate in the company's leadership alongside their father.

Bibliography

• "... dann bin ich auf den Baum geklettert!" Über Aufstieg, Mut und Wandel (2018)
• Der neunte Arm des Oktopus (2021)