By Jae-Ha Kim
Chicago Sun-Times
March 19, 2002
Oprah Winfrey had better start taking some tips from Suze Orman, the financial whiz who writes for Winfrey’s magazine.
Seems our billionairess is so cautious about investing her own money in the stock market that she once hoarded $50 million in cash, calling it her personal “bag-lady fund.”
Winfrey has amassed a $1 billion fortune, but according to the April 1 issue of Fortune magazine, she claims to know little about business.
“I don’t think of myself as a businesswoman,” she says in the new issue, which hits stores Monday. “There’s this part of me that’s afraid of what will happen if I believe it all.”
These are surprising words from a woman who literally got millions of devotees to believe they can be whatever they choose. Her own rags-to-riches story couldn’t have turned out any better than the feel-good made-for-TV movies (such as “Tuesdays with Morrie”) she produces. Besides “The Oprah Winfrey Show”–which has 22 million U.S. viewers and generated more than $300 million last year–she is a movie star (“Beloved”) and magazine publisher (O, The Oprah Magazine).
Winfrey also has a piece of the cable TV market with the Oxygen Network, for which she produces and stars in a show called “Use Your Life.” She has so much power that a seal of approval by Oprah’s Book Club spikes sales at least tenfold.
Her “guru” business last year generated $1.6 million in ticket sales as 8,500 women in four cities paid $185 each to hear her speak on her “Live Your Best Life” tour.
And while most successful magazines usually need an incubation period of five years to turn a profit, O generated more than $140 million last year. With a paid circulation of 2.5 million–more than either Vogue or Martha Stewart Living–it is the most successful start-up magazine ever.
It is only after the Fortune reporter presents her with a litany of her financial accomplishments that Winfrey finally begrudgingly admits: “Yeah, I guess I am a businesswoman.”
Yet Winfrey tells Fortune that she has no interest in balance sheets or hobnobbing with businessmen such as Jack Welch or Michael Dell. When she was asked to sit on the corporate boards for some of America’s top companies, she told them, “Guys, I don’t know what I’d be doing on your board.”
