The owners’ fortunes came from three very different business backgrounds: the Rao family’s poultry and animal-health businesses, Alan Pace’s finance and sports-management career, and Trevor Hemmings’ housebuilding, property and leisure interests. Those histories explain where their money and business experience came from; they do not provide a reliable, current like-for-like valuation of the three ownership groups.
How the three ownership stories compare
| Club and ownership | Documented source of wealth or business background | What the available figures establish |
|---|---|---|
| Blackburn Rovers — Rao family and Venky’s/VH Group | Poultry breeding, hatcheries, processed chicken and eggs, poultry vaccines, feed supplements and other animal-health products. | The documented businesses establish a poultry and related-industry background, but not the current personal wealth of individual family members. |
| Burnley FC — Alan Pace, ALK Capital and Velocity Sports Partners | Pace’s background includes investment banking and sports management. ALK’s sports arm, Velocity Sports Partners, became Burnley’s majority investor in 2020. | The public biographies and ownership records describe his career and the investment structure, but do not give a reliable personal fortune or a breakdown of what he made in each role. |
| Preston North End — the Hemmings family | Trevor Hemmings began in housebuilding and later accumulated interests in property, leisure and sport. | The Sunday Times Rich List estimate reported for Hemmings was £1.115 billion in 2021. It is a dated estimate for him, not a current valuation of his family. |
Blackburn Rovers: the Rao family’s poultry and animal-health businesses
Venky’s, the name associated with Blackburn Rovers’ owners, was formed by the Rao family. BBC Sport reported that the family took over the club in 2010. The family’s business background is rooted in Venkateshwara Hatcheries, or VH Group, and its poultry operations.
VH Group’s business profile describes a spread of related activities: poultry breeding and hatcheries, processed chicken and eggs, vaccines for poultry, feed supplements and animal-health products. That range gives a clearer picture than describing the business simply as a chicken producer: its activities extend from breeding and food products into products and services for animal health.
This is evidence of the family’s business sectors, not a published balance sheet for the owners. It does not establish what any individual Rao family member is worth today or how much of that wealth is attributable to any one VH Group activity.
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Burnley FC: Alan Pace’s finance and sports-management career
Burnley’s official board biographies say Pace began his financial career at Lehman Brothers, became a managing director and later led Major League Soccer club Real Salt Lake. That record supports describing his background as a combination of finance and sports management, rather than attributing his wealth to one disclosed business or investment.
ALK Capital says its sports investment arm, Velocity Sports Partners, became a majority investor in Burnley in 2020. A Companies House record identifies Velocity Capital (UK) Holdings Ltd as a person with significant control of Burnley FC Holdings, with notification in 2023. These details show that the club sits within an investment structure; they do not disclose how much personal capital Pace contributed or establish his net worth.
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Preston North End: Trevor Hemmings’ move from housebuilding to property and leisure
Obituaries describe Hemmings as starting out in housebuilding, forming building businesses and selling them. He later built up interests across property and leisure, as well as sport. The Guardian characterizes his fortune as property-derived, and he controlled Preston from 2010. In this case, the reported path runs from building businesses into a broader portfolio; Preston ownership was one later part of that story, not its starting point.
The Racing Post reported a Sunday Times Rich List estimate of £1.115 billion for Hemmings in 2021. Treat that as a historical estimate attributed to a particular publication and year—not as a current figure, a confirmed measure of liquid assets, or an estimate for the Hemmings family as a whole. After his death, the Hemmings family was identified as Preston’s owner.
Why a current wealth ranking would be misleading
There is only one specific personal wealth estimate in these accounts: Hemmings’ 2021 Rich List figure. The available sources do not provide comparable current estimates for the Rao family owners or Pace. Ranking the three by personal fortune would therefore mix a dated estimate for one person with incomplete information about two other ownership groups.
It is also important to separate a club’s ownership structure from an owner’s personal finances. A company or investment vehicle may hold a club, but that fact alone does not reveal the value of the individuals’ wider assets, their share of the investment, or the source and terms of the money used. The business histories explain the owners’ documented backgrounds; they are not equivalent to current personal net-worth statements.
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