Норвеж миллиардері Петтер Стордален: табыс жолы мен қайырымдылық қызметі

Norwegian billionaire businessman

Petter Anker Stordalen Bjorvand (born 29 November 1962) is a Norwegian businessman. With an estimated net worth of US$1 billion as of 2023, he is the owner of the Strawberry Group, a conglomerate of ten companies in hotels, shopping centers, real estate, finance, and art. Through Strawberry Hospitality Group, he owns Nordic Choice Hotels, consisting of over 200 hotels and 17,000 employees. In the later stages of his career, Stordalen has pursued a number of philanthropic endeavors alongside his wife, the doctor and environmentalist Gunhild Stordalen; through their Stordalen Foundation, established in 2011, they have donated large amounts of money to various scientific research programs and charities focused on addressing climate change. He has been a co owner of SunClass Airlines since 2019.

Petter Anker Stordalen Bjorvand was born in Porsgrunn on 29 November 1962, the son of Kari and Knut Anker Stordalen (1933–1994). At the age of 10, he began helping in his father's grocery store. At the age of 12, he began selling strawberries at the local market. He already displayed his business acumen at this time; in 1974, the local Porsgrunns Dagblad newspaper named him Norway's top strawberry seller, beating out his competition of market workers who were decades older than him. Following high school, he attended Kjøpmannsinstituttet for one year, then managed his father's store for a short time before joining the Norwegian School of Marketing.

At 24 he took over what was, at the time, the largest shopping center in Norway, City Syd, in Trondheim as the country's youngest shopping center manager. After posting record profits at City Syd he became property director in Atle Brynestad's company Made in. As property director Stordalen was the architect behind the conversion of the former market area in downtown Trondheim and the re launch of Liertoppen shopping centre outside Oslo. He was also put in charge of the Bik Bok brand

Following a number of transactions within the Brynestad system Stordalen, at the age of 29, found himself an employee of Realkreditt's (later DnB) property development company. The purchase of Steen & Strøm signaled the start of a wave of acquisitions, and in the span of three years the newly formed company, Steen & Strøm Invest, became the country's largest holder of commercial real estate.

After leaving Steen & Strøm Invest, Stordalen struck out on his own teaming up with investor Christen Sveaas. In October 1996 the duo bought 68 percent of the shares in the Scandinavian operations of Choice Hotels for NOK 100 million. At the time the chain consisted of 8 hotels across Scandinavia. Following the acquisition Stordalen started his expansion, following the same model as in Steen & Strøm Invest, buying Swedish hotel chain Home as well as Norwegian hotel company InterNor, and taking Choice Hotels Scandinavia public. During a three year period Choice Hotels Scandinavia bought, on average, a new hotel every other week and added 50 people to the payroll every 10 days. In December 1997 Sveaas sold his 37 percent share of the now 77 hotels. In 1999 Christian Ringnes and his company Eiendomsspar acquired a 35 percent share in Choice Hotels Scandinavia. After a short power struggle, Ringnes folded and Stordalen cemented his control over the company. The same year Stordalen also saw the acquisition of several Swedish and Danish hotels, including the Danish hotel company Nordisk Hotel Group, Stenungsbaden Yacht Club and Stockholm Globe Hotel. At the turn of the millennium, at age 37, Stordalen became a billionaire(in Norwegian krone). In 2012 Stordalen opened his biggest hotel to date, the 500 room, Clarion Post Hotel in Gothenburg, Sweden. At the opening 10,000 Gothenburgers were gathered to watch a light and fireworks display that included Stordalen ascending from the top of the hotel playing the drums inside a disco ball. In 2022, Stordalen opened the 231 room, art deco Somerro Hotel in Oslo, built from the 1930s office that previously belonged to Oslo Lysverker the city's electrical company. The hotel is the first in Oslo to feature a rooftop pool and terrace, and is situated in Frogner, one of Oslo's oldest neighborhoods. The hotel also features a cinema, multiple restaurants and bars, a library, and a sauna.

In 2000 Stordalen formed the company Home Invest, consisting of the properties previously owned by Choice Hotels Scandinavia. The company went public, but was delisted in 2001. In 2003 Choice Hotels Scandinavia bought shares in Swedish property owner and developer Capona. In 2004 Stordalen's Home Invest sold 19 hotel properties to Capona with settlement in shares giving him a majority interest. In 2006 Capona changed name to Home Properties. In 2005 Home Invest bought the remaining shares in Choice Hotels Scandinavia and delisted the company. In 2006 Home Properties spun off Home Capital as an investment company and listed it on the First North Stock Exchange in Stockholm. In 2007, Stordalen's Home Invest acquired all the shares in Home Capital and delisted the company. In 2009, Stordalen did the same with Home Properties. In 2019, Nordic Choice Hotels acquired Kämp Collection Hotels.

As his fortune grew, Stordalen started investing in art, mostly contemporary. His first buy was a painting by the American artist Ross Bleckner which still hangs at his private estate. In an interview in September 2012, renown Swedish curator Sune Nordgren stated that Stordalen was the European answer to American hotelier Steve Wynn. This partly due to the fact that Stordalen had "redefined" hotel art by spending in excess of five million dollars in contemporary art on his two latest hotels alone, Clarion Hotel Post in Gothenburg and Clarion Hotel & Congress in Trondheim and have a private collection which is valued at around 30 million dollars. Stordalen has world leading collections of artists like Jaume Plensa, Alex Katz and Franz West. He also owns some of Andy Warhol's best interpretations of Norwegian artist Edvard Munch. In the article the value of his total collections (private and business combined) was said to be more valued to more than 50 million dollars. These are some of his known art possessions: Franz Wests «Lemure», Miwa Yanagis «Elevator Girls», Bård Breiviks «Partitur», Alex Katz' «Kirsten in a baseball hat», Jaume Plensas «Tattoo», Julian Opies «Suzanne Walking» and Damien Hirsts «Stamp Out Pleasure And Pain».

Stordalen first made his mark as an environmentalist in Norway, supporting the Bellona Foundation in the fight to free their expert Alexander Nikitin, who had been charged with treason for his contributions to a Bellona report on nuclear safety within the Russian Northern Fleet. Stordalen has also participated in personal activism; in 2002, he broke into Sellafield, a British nuclear treatment plant in Cumbria, and chained himself to the bridge of the plant for nine hours to protest the discharging of the radioactive element technetium 99 into the sea. In 2007, he was charged with trespassing after entering a restricted area in Malmøyakalven to protest the dumping of toxic mud in the Oslofjord. Together with his wife, Gunhild Stordalen, he founded the Stordalen Foundation to focus primarily on climate change. Rainforest Foundation Fund: Through the collaboration between Nordic Choice Hotels and Rainforest Foundation Norway the equivalent of 75 500 soccer fields of rainforest were conserved every year from 2010 to 2015. Technological development: The Stordalen foundation supports the non profit environmental organization Zero. At the annual Zero conference in 2011 the couple secured their personal acquaintance Arnold Schwarzenegger as keynote speaker. Renewable energy: In 2009 Petter Stordalen bought 67% of the shares in ECOHZ; an independent provider of Renewable energy with Guarantees of Origin. Today ECOHZ is the market leader, with an expected growth of 10% in 2012.
International Climate Agreements: The foundation supports the European Climate Foundation (ECF) and his wife Gunhild Anker Stordalen serves on the organization's supervisory committee. In January 2012 the couple participated in Al Gore's Climate Reality Project's expedition to the Antarctic
Consumer behavior: In June 2011 the couple founded GreeNudge. The purpose of the organization is to support and advance research on how climate initiatives, behaviorism, and communication interact. The goal of the foundation is to give decision makers the knowledge they need in order to implement effective climate policies. All hotels in Stordalen's hotel company, Nordic Choice Hotels, are certified according to the ISO 14001 standard. Stordalen's hotel company, Nordic Choice Hotels, is Executive Business Partner of the EAT Initiative.

Stordalen resides in Oslo. From his first marriage to a woman named Ingrid, he has a daughter named Emilie and two sons named Henrik and Jakob. Stordalen began dating doctor and former model Gunhild Stordalen in the mid 2000s. He proposed on top of Aspen Mountain on New Year's Eve 2008, and they were married on 12 June 2010. The wedding was held in Marrakech and cost the equivalent of $5 million, making it Scandinavia's most expensive wedding. The ceremony included chartering an airplane for the guests and booking every room in La Mamounia, one of the world's finest luxury hotels. The wedding was officiated by Irish musician Bob Geldof, with 240 of Norway's foremost celebrities attending. It received press attention normally reserved for royal weddings; Norway's largest tabloid, Verdens Gang, opened a digital guestbook on its website for the public to leave well wishes. The couple were dubbed "the Bill and Melinda Gates of Norway" by the Norwegian tabloids for their combination of business and philanthropy. In November 2019, they announced that they had separated but would remain friends and collaborators. Following the 2011 Utøya shooting, Stordalen donated 5 million kroner to the Workers' Youth League to rebuild the summer camp.