Bill and Jean Adderley started out selling ready-made curtains on a market stall in Leicester in 1979.
The business now has 175 stores, 10,000 staff and a stock market value of more than £1.5billion.
Results published yesterday for the year to the start of July showed profits leapt by 32.4 percent to £209million on sales up 16.2 percent to £1.55billion.
The strong performance prompted the retailer to announce a final dividend of 26p a share. Together with an earlier interim dividend, it took the full-year ordinary dividend to 40p.
Among the big winners from the payout is the Adderley family, who still hold a near 43 percent stake.
Sir Will Adderley, Sir Bill’s son and deputy chairman, owns a almost 38 percent stake, and his mother Jean almost five percent.
They are due £22.5million worth of final dividends, on top of £12million from the interim payout. Last year also saw Dunelm pay a bumper 65p-a-share special dividend.
The company said yesterday that sales had remained robust in the first 10 weeks of its new financial year.
Sales of its new Winter Warm range were strong, it said. Bosses also highlighted demand for onesies and oversized hoodies.
Nick Wilkinson, chief executive, said: “We feel confident and well prepared to weather the current economic pressures.”
“We emerged from an unprecedented global pandemic as a bigger, better business and we believe we have the tools in place to do that again.”
The firm increased pay by more than seven percent on average for staff. It also hired more than 800 extra workers during the year.
Russ Mould, investment director at broker AJ Bell, said: “For now, the company is sticking with full-year forecasts.”
“But even Dunelm can’t change the economic weather and it seems likely sales will eventually suffer.”
