Karl Albrecht, who has died aged 94, was the co-founder with his younger brother Theo of Aldi, one of the world's most successful discount supermarket chains. Although the family had a reputation for being frugal and reclusive, Karl's fortune was estimated at more than £12bn, which reportedly made him the wealthiest man in Germany.
The brothers had served in the Wehrmacht during the second world war, but in different theatres. Karl fought in Russia; while Theo served in the Afrika Korps. Both were captured, but at the end of the war were quickly returned to Essen, the city where they had been born. There they found that their mother's small grocery store stood unscathed amid the ruins left by the Allied bombing of the severely battered Ruhr industrial region.
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