Charles Francis Feeney (April 23, 1931 – October 9, 2023) was an Irish-American businessman and philanthropist who made his fortune as a co-founder of Duty Free Shoppers Group, the travel retailer of luxury products based in Hong Kong.
As a youth, Feeney worked selling Christmas cards door-to-door, as a golf caddy, and shoveling snow from driveways.
[5] He served as a U.S. Air Force radio operator during the Korean War and began his career selling duty-free liquor to U.S. naval personnel at Mediterranean ports in the 1950s.
[10] A breakthrough came in the early 1960s when DFS secured a concession for duty-free sales in Hawaii, allowing the company to market its products to Japanese travelers.
[13] Laura Bird wrote in The Wall Street Journal: "The rich returns came about in large part because DFS, like most other retailers in Asia, took a far higher markup on Western luxury items than was the case in Europe and the U.S.
Quoting the president of Atlantic, The New York Times wrote: "Beyond Mr. Feeney's reticence about blowing his own horn, 'it was also a way to leverage more donations—some other individual might contribute to get the naming rights.
[22] More controversially, Feeney gave substantial personal donations to Sinn Féin, a left-wing Irish nationalist party that has been historically associated with the IRA.
[14] Following the IRA ceasefire in 1994, he funded the party's office in Washington D.C.[20] Feeney supported the modernization of public-health structures in Vietnam,[18] AIDS clinics in South Africa, Operation Smile's free surgeries for children with cleft lips and palates, earthquake relief in Haiti, and the UCSF Medical Center at the University of California at San Francisco.
[8] Jim Dwyer wrote in The New York Times that none of the one thousand buildings on five continents that were built with Feeney's gifts of $2.7 billion bear his name.
[25] Over the years, Atlantic warned about phishing emails claiming to come from the foundation or from Chuck Feeney himself, saying that they want to distribute money to "randomly selected individuals" worldwide and asking the recipient for personal details.
[25] Forbes magazine called Feeney the "James Bond of Philanthropy" due to the stealthy and successful manner in which he anonymously donated approximately $8 billion to various charities.
"[27] He shunned publicity, although he cooperated in his 2007 biography, The Billionaire Who Wasn't: How Chuck Feeney Made and Gave Away a Fortune Without Anyone Knowing.
[32][33] In 2012, he was awarded the UCSF Medal for outstanding personal contributions to the health science mission of the University of California, San Francisco.
[39] He was appointed an Honorary Companion of the Order of Australia in August for his service to Australian health, education and research through the Atlantic Philanthropies.
[40] Feeney was known for his frugality; according to a New York Times article in 2017, "Until he was 75, he traveled only in coach, and carried reading materials in a plastic bag."