Pretty Little Thing boss hands out Christmas gifts to strangers on Twitter

The chief executive of online retailer Pretty Little Thing has handed out thousands of pounds worth of Christmas presents to strangers on Twitter.

Boss of the fast-fashion company, Umar Kamani, 31, from Manchester, selected various strangers on the social media platform – and offered them hugely generous gifts during his one-house feel-good spree.

The businessman, who is the son of billionaire Boohoo founder Mahmud Kamani, launched an online hashtag called #PrettyLittleWishes for an hour at 5pm yesterday – so he could ‘give back’ to those he felt deserved a festive treat.

The gifts include giving an all-expenses-paid trip to New York to a woman who asked for a pizza while she watched Home Alone – and nearly £1000 to pay off a student’s debt so she could concentrate on her revision.

The chief executive of online retailer Pretty Little Thing, Umar Kamani, 31, from Manchester, selected various strangers on Twitter to give cash gifts to on Christmas Day

The fashion mogul, who is the son of billionaire Boohoo founder Mahmud Kamani, launched an online hashtag called #PrettyLittleWishes and gifted for an hour. (Pictured with friend and fan of the brand Paris Hilton)

Keeley Ray, from Liverpool, told how she is raising money for her Auntie Nikki’s stage 4 cancer, saying ‘any support’ would give would be hugely appreciated.

Umar replied: ‘Hi Keeley, Merry Christmas! I’ll donate £1000 towards your auntie’s cancer treatment. I hope this helps! Send her my love and have a beautiful day’.

The grand total of Nikki’s gofundme page is now £19,468.

And Twitter user Jules, from Fife, told Umar she was having to endure dialysis three times a week while she’s on the transplant list for a kidney.

The gifts included giving an all-expenses-paid trip to New York City for a woman who asked for a pizza while she watched Home Alone – and nearly £1000 to pay off a student’s debt so she could concentrate on revision

She asked for either the chance to meet Scottish singer Lewis Capaldi, a new wardrobe as she’s lost seven and-a-half-stone due to her treatment or help to get her dream wedding dress.

Making not one, but two of her wishes come true, Umar wrote: ‘Happy Christmas Jules! Keep fighting I’m going to send you £1000 go buy your dream Wedding Dress and some new clothes. Have a magical day lots of love.’

Lauren Miller from Manchester asked for a pizza after watching Home Alone 2, and said that she would love to visit New York City one day.

Umar obliged: ‘Hey Lauren, Happy Christmas! Let’s make that dream a reality. I’ll pay for you and a friend to go visit New York for a weekend Home Alone 2 style. The cheese pizza is the best there have a wonderful Christmas’.

WHO IS PRETTY LITTLE THING FOUNDER UMAR KAMANI?

Umar is the son of Mahmud Kamani, 52, who managed to turn a Manchester market stall into a vast fortune.

He set up Boohoo in 2006 with the intention of selling up-to-date clothes for low prices.

Today, Boohoo has a workforce of 1,415, with teams in Manchester, Burnley, London, New York and Los Angeles.

It is endorsed by celebrities like Little Mix and the cast of TOWIE, and is worth an eye-watering £2.6 billion.

In 2006 Umar started working for the family business as a manager, while attending theatre school.

He went on to study international business at Manchester Metropolitan University, and in 2012 he and his brother Adam co-funded PrettyLittleTthing after witnessing the phenomenal success of Boohoo.

Before he founded PrettyLittleThing, Umar Kamani admits he was an amateur boxer and playboy who cared only about partying and chasing women. Now he calls this rather hedonistic lifestyle ‘work’.

One day he’s ‘topping up his vitamin D’ in the infinity pool at the luxury Monastero Santa Rosa Hotel in Italy, where a sea view suite will set you back nearly £3,000 a night.

The next, he’s at the wheel of a Riva yacht cruising along the Amalfi coast before posing on the bonnet of his £264,000 Rolls-Royce Dawn in Beverly Hills.

Or maybe he’d prefer his £300,000 Lamborghini Aventador roadster or the coupe version with personalised number plate. For more rugged trips, he has two Hummers and a £92,000 customised Mercedes G-class.

You’ll find him lunching at Nobu in Malibu, California, in a pair of £450 Gucci slippers, with a gold Rolex on his arm. He hangs out with rapper P Diddy at the Grammys and Kylie Jenner at the Coachella music festival in California. All events are, naturally, recorded on his smartphone, which has a £790 Louis Vuitton cover.

His five-year plan, he says, is ‘to make as much money as possible’ and escape his father’s shadow, admitting that half the reason Mahmud helped him start PrettyLittleThing was to ‘get me on the right track’.

‘I’m a rich man’s son and that’s not what I want to be,’ he says. ‘So yes, I have got something to prove. I want to be the rich man. I want to be the successful person.’

PrettyLittleThing is still very much the junior partner of the Boohoo empire, with sales of £11.2 million last year. But it is expanding fast.

It employs 300 staff and counts singers Miley Cyrus, Rita Ora and Nicki Minaj among its fans.

‘If you’re going to be in competition, I would rather keep it in the family,’ says Umar.

Others who were lucky included Ellie and Yli, who each received £500 and £300 respectively to spoil themselves or their loved ones.

Elsewhere, gifts included a trip to Manchester to visit the Pretty Little Thing head office, complete with a dining experience at luxury restaurant Rosso, a £100 voucher for gifts and a £10 voucher for the online retailer.

In 2012, Kamani and his brother Adam co-founded PrettyLittleThing after witnessing the phenomenal success of Boohoo.

The fashion guru also helped by paying off student debt, and gave users Emily and Amy £933.49 and £1360.19 respectively so they could stop focusing on money and ‘get back to revision’.

Other wishers Ellie and Yli received £500 and £300 respectively to ‘spoil’ themselves

He wrote: ‘Happy Christmas Amy! Get back to focusing on Uni I’ll pay off your overdraft £1360.19 consider it done have a wonderful 2020 stay focused.’

To Emily he went on:’ Merry Christmas. Get back to revision and let me clear up that £933.49 overdraft. I got you covered. Have a wonderful day’.

The Kamani family has a rags-to-riches back story, with Indian immigrant Mahmud managing to grow his market stall into a multi-billion pound business.

Mahmud’s father Abdullah went to school with Mahatma Gandhi in Gujurat, India. Abdullah moved the family to Kenya, where many Indian families had prospered under the British Empire.

Other gifts included a trip to Manchester to visit the Pretty Little Thing head office, complete with a dining experience at luxury restaurant Rosso, an £100 voucher for gifts and a ten pound voucher for the online retailer

The family eventually settled in Manchester, where the entrepreneurial Abdullah sold handbags on a market stall to feed his family, before investing in property and founding the wholesale textile business Pinstripe, where Mahmud worked, using family connections in India to source garments.

In 2012, Kamani and his brother Adam co-founded PrettyLittleThing after witnessing the phenomenal success of Boohoo. (Pictured with brand ambassador Molly Mae Hague in Dublin)

Today the brand has a workforce of over 1,000, and plenty of celebrity advocates. (Kamani pictured with Jasmin sanders, Larsa Pippen and Shanina Shaik at Paris Hilton’s Halloween bash)

By the early 2000s, the firm was selling nearly £50 million of clothing a year to High Street names such as New Look, Primark and Philip Green’s Topshop.

Spotting the potential in the growth of the internet, Mahmud set up his online retailer in 2006 that would deliver their own-branded fashion at rock bottom prices, starting out with just three staff and operating out of a Manchester warehouse.

Today it has a workforce of over 1,000, and celebrity advocates including everyone from, Paris Hilton, Love Island stars, Little Mix to Tallia Storm.