Gary Vaynerchuk is popular for various reasons that include being a motivational speaker, an author, and internet influencer. As much as these things have made him popular, they are responsible for the huge wealth he commands. Through his industrious efforts, Vaynerchuk has become the face of a $100 million-dollar company focused on digital media. His work has made him one of the leading digital strategists in the world, having worked with major global brands like General Electric and PepsiCo.
Disregarding the fame and wealth the internet has helped him acquire, Gary has always been a fine businessman, an entrepreneurial guru who has thrived as a family man as much as he has enjoyed a successful career.
Gary Vaynerchuk’s Humble Beginning
They say anyone can come to the United States and make it. It is a story that has been told over and over again. While that might not be true for everyone, it has certainly been the case for the Vaynerchuk family who relocated from the now-dissolved Soviet Union to the United States when Gary Vaynerchuk was a child.
He was born on the 14th of November 1975 to Sasha and Tamara Vaynerchuk. Gary was one of the three children born to his parents, he has a brother named AJ and a sister named Liz.
He was raised until his teenage years in Queens, where his entire family lived in a studio-apartment before they relocated to New Jersey. There, Gary completed his high school education at North Hunterdon High School.
A Look at His Business Exploits
From selling flowers and lemonade as a child to making thousands of dollars on baseball cards as a teen, Vaynerchuk is no stranger to business. After high school, Gary Vaynerchuk headed to Mount Ida College in Massachusetts. He graduated from the institution with a bachelor’s degree in 1998.
Having gained more than enough experience while growing up with his business-oriented father, Gary didn’t hesitate to join the family business after college. His family owned a liquor store in Springfield, New Jersey, which was named Shopper’s Discount Liquors.
Once he joined, Gary Vaynerchuk changed the business name to Wine Library, kickstarting a transformative process that would make him a multimillionaire. Along with the name change came a YouTube channel named Wine Library TV, where he critiqued and reviewed wines.
He also launched an online sales store for the shop, taking advantage of the growing e-commerce industry. The changes and additions to the business helped grow it from a $3 million company to a $60 million business within just five years.
He Subsequently Became a Social Media Influencer
The YouTube channel, Wine Library TV, which he opened in 2006, quickly garnered a considerable following. Because of that, Gary was invited by The Conan Show in 2008, followed by several other reputable publications and TV shows.
His growing reach soon spread to Twitter in May 2007, and actively grew there as well. The platform where he now has over 2.1 million followers has become one of his major ways of reaching his growing audience.
He also owns GaryVee, a YouTube channel with over 2.67 million subscribers. Through this channel, he carries his audience along daily in his struggles and successes as a businessman.
Gary Founded VaynerMedia
After working as the head of the wine business for 13 years, Gary Vaynerchuk relinquished control and set out to build one of his biggest entrepreneurial endeavors, VaynerMedia.
Along with his brother AJ, Gary founded the digital marketing agency which quickly became one of the leading companies for social media and strategy services. Since its creation in 2009, the company has grown to have over 740 employees with an estimated annual revenue of $131 million.
VaynerMedia, along with VaynerCommerce, is a subsidiary of the parent company VaynerX, all owned by Gary. He has another called Gallery Media Group, a hybrid between a publishing company and a creative agency.
He’s Also a Motivational Speaker and Author
Gary Vaynerchuk has leveraged his success to become a published author and a public speaker. As an author, he has published several best-selling books on how to become as successful as he is in numerous ventures.
As a speaker, he gets invited to speak at various occasions across the US every year. He makes an average of $100,000 per presentation.
He also owns a successful podcast covering topics on all of his undertakings, from entrepreneurial and digital marketing advice to #AskGaryVee episodes and everything in between.
Gary Vaynerchuk’s Net Worth In 2020
Within two decades of being active, Gary Vaynerchuk has been able to build a net worth of over $160 million. His net worth comes from the above-mentioned ventures. Also, he earns from PureWow, a women’s lifestyle company, and ONE37pm, a men’s lifestyle brand.
Being someone that optimizes opportunities, Gary has investments in companies like Uber, Twitter, and Facebook, all of which yield positive returns. He is also a published author who has written over six books out of which four have earned the coveted badge as New York Times bestsellers.
In addition to the foregoing, he is a partner to Green Streets, Resy, and VaynerSports. All of these are the ways Gary Vaynerchuk has been able to amass his staggering net worth.
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Family Comes First for the Entrepreneur
The measure of a beautiful life for many people resides in success in their chosen profession and their marital life. In both regards, Gary Vaynerchuk is a successful man. He has been married to his wife Lizzie Vaynerchuk since 2004.
The duo met on a Jewish dating site called JDate, and their first date was all it took for Gary to decide as she had everything he wanted in a wife.
The couple has built a beautiful life together with two lovely children: a son named Xander Avi who was born in 2012 and his sister Misha Eva Vaynerchuk born in 2009. Best known as the wife of a multimillionaire, Lizzie contributes to the family’s growth by focusing on running their home smoothly.
Admitting that he probably wouldn’t have come this far without his wife’s mental strength and emotional support, Gary Vaynerchuk describes Lizzie as an independent, big-thinking woman. According to him, her contributions allow him to fully immerse himself in work without having to worry about the kids or their personal life.
Speaking of kids, Gary and Lizzie raise theirs to remain a part of the cultural shift. Unlike other parents who frown at their children’s obsession with gadgets, the Vaynerchuks encourage it. Interestingly, as pivotal as social media has been to his success, Gary is married to a recluse. Despite her reserved manners, however, the supportive wife often accompanies her hubby to important events.
As the multimillionaire often says, family comes first before everything else, and he has had one to go home to for over a decade now with no scandal to speak of. The Vaynerchuks currently resides in New York.
