CEO of Burberry

Children: Jennings, Sommer and Angelina

Twitter: @AngelaAhrendts

Burberry was founded in 1856 by 21-year-old Thomas Burberry after he invented gabardine. The brand began selling outerwear, developed its trademark check pattern in 1901 and the trench coat in 1914. So how did one of the oldest heritage brands in the world develop into one of the most tech savvy fashion brands around? It’s thanks in no small part to CEO Angela Ahrendts.

Ahrendts, a native of New Palestine, Indiana, worked at Donna Karan, Henri Bendel and Liz Claiborne before joining Burberry in 2006 as CEO. During her tenure at Burberry she has broadcast the brand’s runway show in 3-D simultaneously in New York, Tokyo, Dubai and Paris, pioneered click-and-buy technology where consumers can shop the runway and get deliveries well before they hit stores and has been a social media innovator. With over 540,000 Twitter followers and over 8.5 million Facebook fans, Burberry has been well ahead of the curve in the online space. Most recently the brand previewed its Spring 2012 Burberry Prorsum collection on Twitter before it hit the runway. Burberry also launched TheArtoftheTrench.com, a social-media site where people can submit photos of themselves in the company’s iconic rainwear. Burberry’s profits meanwhile have soared under Ahrendts leadership, almost doubling in 2010.

Ahrendts told WSJ magazine last year that her success “could never have happened this way without Gregg being willing to take some pretty amazing chances,” speaking of her husband who sold his New York contracting business to move to the London suburbs and become a stay-at-home dad.