Pop star with the ‘mezzo-soprano voice’ and X Factor judge extraordinaire, Cheryl Cole has an estimated net worth of £20 million.
Born Cheryl Ann Tweedy to Joan Callaghan and Gary Tweedy in Newcastle upon Tyne on June 30, 1983, Cheryl Cole began her career as a model for TV ads at the age of seven, winning several modelling competitions.
How did Cheryl Cole break into the music industry and make millions of pounds?
She appeared in the reality show Popstars: The Rivals in 2002, where she was chosen to be part of the new pop group Girls Aloud, whose debut song Sound of the Underground topped the UK Singles Chart. The album that followed was certified platinum by The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) in 2003.
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Girls Aloud accomplished a series of 20 successive top ten singles in the UK, which included four number ones as well as six platinum albums, entering the Guinness Book of Records as the ‘Most Successful Reality TV Group’ of all time in 2007.
Joining The X Factor panel in June 2008, Cole emerged as the victorious judge mentoring Alexandra Burke and won again next year alongside singer Joe McElderry.
Following her ‘axing’ from her role on the US X Factor, Cole sued production company Blue Orbit for a reported £1.4 million in 2012, receiving a £1.1 million payout for the first season. She then sued for a reported £1.25 million for the second, winning an undisclosed settlement from the company in November 2013.
Cole was chosen as L’Oréal’s new face of 2009, elevating her earnings to a reported $5 to 7 million per year.
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In April 2009, Cole went solo with 3 Words, her debut platinum album, which reached number one in the UK charts. The album’s first single, Fight for This Love, became 2009’s fourth best-selling UK single. The album’s second and third singles, the platinum 3 Words and gold Parachute, also hit Britain’s top five.
In October 2010, Messy Little Raindrops, Cole’s second album, went to number one in the UK charts. Promise This, the first single, also reached the top of the charts and was yet another platinum-seller.
Reaching number two in the UK charts in 2012, Cole’s third album, A Million Lights, went gold. Opening single Call My Name also shifted an impressive 417,000 copies in the UK.
Cole’s first solo tour in 2012, launched to promote A Million Lights, collected a reported $1.2 million.
Following a tenth anniversary reunion of Girls Aloud in March 2013 – involving a lucrative million-selling tour of the UK and Ireland – the group officially confirmed their split.
Cole returned as a UK X Factor judge in March of this year, signing a £1.5 million contract for her involvement on the show.
She announced that her fourth album Only Human would be released in November 2014, with its lead single Crazy Stupid Love topping the UK charts in July, becoming her fourth number one single to date.
The singer’s autobiography, Cheryl: My Story, has sold 275,000 copies generating £2.5 million as of February 2013.
She raised around £3.5 million for charity in March 2009, climbing Kilimanjaro with fellow celebrities for Comic Relief.
Divorced from footballer Ashley Cole since 2010, she recently married Frenchman Jean-Bernard Fernandez-Versini. Her engagement ring and wedding band were worth a reported £300,000.
Also boasting her own signature fragrance StormFlower, Cole owns a Beverly Hills apartment, a Bugatti Veyron as well as an Audi R8.
