Diane Hendricks Now Richer Than Menard!

Diane Hendricks speaking at the 2024 Republican National Convention. Photo taken July 18, 2024 by Graham Kilmer.

It was a year ago that this writer noted that Diane Hendricks was poised to eventually pass John Menard Jr. as the richest person in Wisconsin:

“Hendricks has been steadily gaining on Menard: as recently as 2021 Forbes had her with a net worth of $10.7 billion compared to $16.6 billion for Menard. Now the two have nearly the same net worth. Oh what a horse race we have going in Wisconsin!”

Last week Forbes magazine released its annual ranking of the 400 richest Americans, and lo and behold, Hendricks has now left race-car enthusiast Menard in her rear-view mirror with a new net worth of $22.3 billion, compared to just $20.5 for Wisconsin’s one-time leader.

Hendricks is now the 44th richest American while Menard ranks 48th, down from a year ago, when he ranked 37th. His net worth actually declined by 10% in the past year, dropping from $22.9 billion to a mere $20.5 billion. Wake up John, you’re falling behind!

While John has gotten noticeably smaller, his fellow fat cats have gotten so much larger, as Forbes reported. “The 400 richest people in the U.S. are worth a record $6.6 trillion after getting $1.2 trillion richer over the past year amid surging stock markets and AI mania. A decade ago, when it took $1.7 billion to make The Forbes 400, a net worth of $3.8 billion was comfortably within the top half of the ranking—now that lofty sum is the minimum required.”

Oh yes, you have keep hiking your wealth to stay in that elite club. But here’s the good news for Wisconsin: We still have seven members of the wealthy elect living in our state and breathing the same air! That’s 1.75% of the total, by the way, exactly the same as our share — 1.75% — of America’s total population. That’s Wisconsin for you, always poised near the average.

Inquiring minds might wonder how did Ms. Hendricks manage to pass Mr. Menard after ranking so long behind him? “She led ABC to make the two biggest acquisitions in its history, buying rival Bradco in 2010 and building materials distributor L&W Supply in 2016,” Forbes reported. “The company has over 900 branch locations and had $20.7 billion in 2024 revenues.”

By contrast, Menard’s home improvement retail chain “brings in an estimated $13 billion in sales from more than 340 stores,” Forbes reported. “Menard has developed a reputation for keeping a tight grip on his business, requiring even top executives to punch a time clock every morning.”

Is that overbearing style of management wearing thin? Is that “save big money at Menard’s” jingle losing some of its impact? Does Menard, now 85, lack the energy of that young whipper snapper Hendricks, who is only 78 years old? Readers, feel free to add your own theories.

The richest person in America, according to Forbes, is Elon Musk, with a net worth of $428 billion, or nearly 21 times more wealth than John Menard. I’m beginning to feel sorry for John. Well behind Musk were some of the usual suspects, including Mark Zuckerberg ($253 billion), Jeff Bezos ($241 billion) and Larry Page ($179 billion), whose companies Facebook, Amazon and Alphabet (Google) have often been criticized for monopolistic practices.

It’s all part of a world-wide trend of a growing wealth gap, where the U.S. has become of the leaders, as a new analysis by Best Brokers found. As of 2023, the report found, among the 217 countries in the world, America ranks 25th highest in the percent (35.53%) of all wealth held by the richest 1% and 23rd highest in the percent (71.20%) of all wealth held by the richest 10%. And that was before the top 400 added another $1.2 trillion to their wealth in 2024.

“The United States now ranks closer to Latin American nations in terms of wealth concentration, performing worse compared to other advanced economies such as the United Kingdom, where the richest 10% of the population owns 57.1% of the wealth, Canada (58.0%) and Australia (57.2%),” the report found. “America’s 71.2% share is comparable to Colombia (79%), Mexico (78.4%), and Brazil (77.8%).” In short, America’s wealth gap is verging toward banana republics even as its politics trends in the same direction. Could there be a connection?

Getting back to Wisconsin, its wealthiest folks after Hendricks and Menard were the following five:

Judy Faulkner (181st richest in America): founder of Epic Systems, the Dane County-based health records company, with a net worth of $7.8 billion, up from $7.7 billion in 2023.

James Cargill, II (tied for 319th richest in America): one of 12 heirs to food corporation Cargill, America’s largest private company, but he has long resided in Birchwood in northwest Wisconsin, just 120 miles from Twin Cities. His net worth of $4.8 billion has now put him tied with or slightly ahead of the three Wisconsinites whose wealth comes from the old Johnson Wax company and who used to rank ahead of Cargill. They include:

Helen Johnson-Leipold (tied for 319th richest in America): an heir to SC Johnson, with a net worth of $4.8 billion.

H. Fisk Johnson (tied for 325th richest in America): chairman and CEO of SC Johnson, net worth of $4.7 billion.

S. Curtis Johnson (tied for 325th richest in America): great-great-grandson of SC Johnson founder Samuel Curtis Johnson, net worth of $4.7 billion.

And while they technically live in northern Illinois, we should surely add to our list Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, both 80, who own the Wisconsin company Uline, a shipping and business supplies provider based in Pleasant Prairie. They also have a summer home in Manitowish Waters in Wisconsin’s North Woods, where Elizabeth has quite a large presence, and then add the fact that Richard is a descendant of Milwaukee’s once uber-wealthy Uihlein family. The couple ranked 239th in the nation, according to Forbes, with a net worth of $6.2 billion.

As recently as 2022, the couple didn’t make the Forbes 400 list. That year, in August, the magazine did a story entitled “Meet The Billionaire Couple Pumping Their Fortune Into Right-Wing Politics,” estimating their net worth at $4 billion each. Now they are each worth $6.2 billion, giving them far more money to pump into right-wing politics. Oh, what an American story, circa 2025, they are.