Reg and Hazel Rowe

Brisbane, Retail/Property

REg and Hazel Rowe

Brisbane, Retail/Property

$1 billion (up $429 million). Last year: No.13

After 13 years working as a salesman in a department store, Reg Rowe reckoned he could do better by himself.

He's been proved right on a spectacular scale.

Mr Rowe and his wife Hazel started a mail-order company selling imported battery chargers and other automotive accessories from their home at Bracken Ridge in Brisbane's north in 1972.

It was a mum-and-dad business with an amazing difference - four decades on, it has become the behemoth, Super Retail Group, with more than 580 stores across Australia and New Zealand and a presence in China.

And it's made the modest couple Queensland's newest billionaires.

It nearly didn't happen. The early days were a struggle but, rather than being the end, a "closing down sale" marked the beginning of their business success, enabling them to pay off creditors and start on the journey to Queensland's Rich List.

Within two years, their operation was turning over $1 million and the couple opened their first store at Barry Parade in Fortitude Valley.

After experimenting with different names, they settled on the iconically direct Super Cheap Auto in 1981.

The Rowes reaped about $150 million for 39 per cent of their shares when the company was listed on the stock exchange in 2004.

They still own a stake of nearly 30 per cent which has increased in value by about 75 per cent over the past year to more than $700 million.

They also retain ownership of Supercheap's head office, main warehouse and 30-plus retail sites which deliver more than $9 million a year in in rent.

Mr Rowe, now 69, was managing director until 1996 and then chairman until 2004. He remains on the board.

The company  now called Super Retail Group, continues to go from strength to strength under the leadership of chief executive Peter Birtles, whose own shares are worth more than $34 million.

It is one of the top 10 retailers in Australasia, encompassing eight brands - Supercheap Auto, BCF (Boating Camping Fishing), Rebel, Amart Sports, Goldcross Cycles, FCO (Fishing Camping Outdoors), Ray's Outdoors and Super Retail Commercial - and employs 12,000 staff.

Mr Rowe's new business focus is the Excel Development Group, formed in 2007 in partnership with former Urban Development Institute of Australia president Peter Sherrie.

It has a growing portfolio of commercial, retail and residential holdings including The Edge office complex at Lake Kawana on the Sunshine Coast, an eight-story office block at Alfred St, Fortitude Valley and housing estates in central Queensland mining areas.

Mr and Mrs Rowe, who have four children, remain modest about their achievements. They have lived in the same house in Bridgeman Downs - just two suburbs from where it all started - for 18 years but they did splash out on a beautiful Noosa getaway in 2007.