Tributes have been paid to Isak Andic, the billionaire founder of the Spanish high-street fashion chain Mango, after his death in a hiking accident in Catalonia on Saturday.

According to media reports, Andic, who was 71, died after slipping and falling 100 metres down a ravine while hiking in the Montserrat caves near Barcelona with several family members.

Mango confirmed his death in a statement on Saturday, describing Andic as “an example to us all” and a committed and inspiring leader.

“His legacy reflects the achievements of a business project marked by success, and also by his human quality, his proximity, and the care and affection that he always had and at all times conveyed to the entire organisation,” the statement said.

“His departure leaves a huge void, but all of us are, in some way, his legacy and the testimony of his achievements. It is up to us, and this is the best tribute we can make to Isak and which we will fulfil, to ensure that Mango continues to be the project that Isak aspired to and of which he would feel proud.”

Born to a Sephardic Jewish family in Istanbul in 1953, Andic emigrated to Catalonia with his relatives in the late 1960s, where he started selling T-shirts to fellow students at Barcelona’s American high school.

The young entrepreneur subsequently progressed to running a wholesale business, selling clothes in Barcelona’s street markets, but realised there was more money in retail and opened the first Mango store in the Catalan capital in 1984 as Spain was still emerging from the shadow of the Franco dictatorship.

“He saw that we needed colour, style,” the company’s global retail director, César de Vicente, said in an interview with Agence France-Presse in March 2024.

Andic quickly opened dozens of more stores in Spain and then abroad, starting in neighbouring Portugal and France, all under the name Mango.

He “realised that having the same name, having the same brand in all the shops, would make the concept much stronger”, said De Vicente.

Pedro Sánchez, the Spanish prime minister, led the tributes after Andic’s death was announced on Saturday afternoon.

“My condolences to the family of Isak Andic, the founder of Mango, after his tragic death in an accident,” Sánchez wrote on X, adding that Andic’s “great work and entrepreneurial vision” had made the company he had left behind “a global fashion leader”.

Salvador Illa, the Catalan president, hailed a “a committed businessman who, with his leadership, has contributed to making Catalonia great and projecting it to the world”. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of Spain’s conservative People’s party, said Andic had built “a Spanish business that was a world leader in the textile and fashion sector”.

The Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain said it had been “deeply saddened to hear of the unexpected death of one of the bulwarks of the Spanish Jewish community”.

In a statement, it said: “He was a man of the finest human qualities, generous and always ready to help those most in need. His many contributions have brought about huge advances for Spanish Judaism. The gap he leaves cannot be filled.”

Writing in La Vanguardia on Sunday, the journalist Joana Bonet recalled an “audacious and creative” man who had travelled an enormous distance from his humble beginnings and first forays into the markets of Barcelona.

“If Tommy Hilfiger started out selling jeans from the boot of his car, Andic, a Turkish immigrant who was still a child when he and his family arrived in Barcelona in the 60s … took his first steps in the hippie flea markets,” she wrote. “Andic was a visionary who also possessed a gift: he could go into a shop and know which item would sell out. He never got it wrong.”

Forbes put the entrepreneur’s net worth at $4.5bn (£3.6bn), and he was non-executive chair of the company when he died.

Mango had a turnover of €3.1bn (£2.6bn) in 2023, with 33% of its business online and a presence in more than 120 countries.

The brand’s first UK store opened in 1999 and there are now more than 60 branches across the country.

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