Warhammer maker Games Workshop will make its debut on the blue-chip FTSE 100 index on Monday.
It is the culmination of an astonishing rise for the fantasy figurine maker.
Shares in the Nottingham-based business have risen by nearly 2600 per cent over the past decade, valuing it at just under £4.3billion.
This puts it close on the heels of budget airline EasyJet – worth just over £4.3billion – and B&Q owner Kingfisher at £4.5billion.
The group’s elevation was helped this month when it agreed a final deal with Amazon for the US giant to turn its sci-fi universe Warhammer 40,000 into film and TV shows.
Its ascent to the FTSE 100 comes almost 50 years after Games Workshop’s founders – Ian Livingstone, Steve Jackson and John Peake – set up the company in a Shepherd’s Bush flat in 1975.
Success: The Games Workshop brand makes fantasy figurines
Having started out selling board games, the trio got an early break when Dungeons and Dragons creator Gary Gygax asked to be the hit role-playing game’s exclusive distributor in the UK and Europe. Warhammer followed soon after in 1983 and would become by far the group’s most successful enterprise.
Livingstone and Jackson sold their shares in Games Workshop for £10m in 1991. In 1994, the business listed on the London Stock Exchange and relocated to Nottingham in 1997.
Games Workshop’s headquarters form the heart of the ‘Lead Belt’ – a collection of the world’s largest wargame figurine makers which are based in the East Midlands. From its humble beginnings in the west London flat, the firm has grown into a global behemoth and its former employees have spawned several smaller companies that collectively employ more than 2,600 staff and contribute millions of pounds to the British economy.
While many would dismiss the pastime of sending hand-painted miniatures of fantastical creatures into battle as the preserve of children and maladjusted men in dimly lit basements, Warhammer has legions of devoted fans around the world. Famous enthusiasts include Superman actor Henry Cavill as well as musician Ed Sheeran and former home secretary James Cleverly.
The company’s success is even more remarkable considering the extremely low profile of its executive team.
Long-serving chief executive Kevin Rountree, who has worked at the company for more than a quarter of a century, is an enigma with an almost non-existent public profile.
Finance director Liz Harrison is another Games Workshop veteran, having joined the group in 2000 as finance manager for its German business.
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