Ben Dunne built an empire worth €43m
Tycoon’s gym business could net €36m and his properties €7m
BUSINESSMAN Ben Dunne, who died last week aged 74, had amassed a business and property fortune of tens of millions of euro.
Publicly available company and property records show the gym tycoon’s various businesses had combined net assets of just under €12m – but crucially were making multi-million-euro annual profits.
A source familiar with the matter said his business empire alone could yield as much as €36m if it were sold off as a going concern, after the Dunne group reported profits of €3m last year.
‘Ben reported last year that the group as a whole had turned a profit of €3m. So you would usually be looking at eight to 12 times that price if it were to be sold, lock, stock and barrel. So you would be looking at anywhere upwards of €36m,’ the source said.
A former director of supermarket chain Dunnes Stores, the entrepreneur exited the family business and founded a network of fitness centres across the country.
Accounts for nine of his fitness outlets lodged with the Companies Registration Office for the past year reveal Mr Dunne derived substantial earnings from his eponymous fitness ventures. He would have been free to invest these earnings in any number of other investments – and as such, all publicly available documents will not give a full reckoning of his wealth.
Savvy operator Dunne also acquired several of the properties housing his gyms, including his flagship fitness centre, Carlisle Fitness in Santry, Dublin, and his gym at Westwood in Blanchardstown, west Dublin.
The tycoon also had a personal property portfolio.
Mr Dunne and his wife, Mary, spent their entire married lives living in the leafy west Dublin suburb of Castleknock.
They originally bought a sprawling 10 acres of land on which they built an impressive family home called Winterwood.
In recent years Mr Dunne had sought to off-load the 10-acre site and the house to be redeveloped as apartments. The estimated value of this parcel of land is around the €10m mark, according to sources.
In 2021 Mr Dunne and Mary moved just a stone’s throw up the road and bought a substantial home on the Castleknock Road. This was to have been the family’s final home before Mr Dunne’s untimely death in Dubai last month.
The Castleknock Road property has an estimated market value of €2.5m to €3m.
Property deeds further indicate that Ben Dunne is the sole owner of both properties and that no mortgage is listed on either one.
In addition to his financially robust fitness empire, Mr Dunne also owned a property in the affluent southside area of Clonskeagh. The value of that house is between €1.5m and €1.8m.
That values Mr Dunne’s personal property portfolio at €14m – €7m of which would be his share in the dually owned homes.
If the value of his business and his homes were realised on the market the total could be in the region of €43m.
Mr Dunne died of a heart attack two weeks ago while on holiday in Dubai. A large presence on the nation’s business, political and cultural landscape for the past five decades, he was a former director of Dunnes Stores, which had been founded by his father, Ben Snr. He also played a leading role in the growth of the supermarket empire
and became one of Ireland’s bestknown business figures.
He was arrested for possession of cocaine and soliciting in Florida in 1992. It later emerged he had made payments to two senior politicians, former taoiseach Charles Haughey and former Fine Gael minister
‘Group turned a €3m profit last year’
‘He acquired properties housing his gyms’
Michael Lowry, leading to his departure from Dunnes.
In 1981, Mr Dunne was kidnapped by the IRA, and reports at the time suggested a ransom was paid and that it was arranged by Charles Haughey, who was said to have asked businessman Patrick Gallagher to contribute money.
Mr Dunne denied this, saying, ‘Charlie Haughey and Patrick Gallagher had nothing to do with the ransom being paid whatsoever, in my opinion, and I think I would have an idea if they did had.’
He was buried in Castleknock this week. His son Rob said: ‘I’m going to miss him in a way I can’t even describe in words. My dad is dead. He had a massive heart attack and just didn’t make it. Simple as that. Overall in the final analysis he was a good and decent man.’