London: In joining the royal clan, Kate Middleton is going from her family's business to Britain's first family nicknamed, The Firm.
Her own background should have helped prepare her for the formidable challenge.
The Middleton clan is blessed with strong ties and commercial savvy. Kate's parents, Michael and Carole, went from airline employees to owners of a successful small business who gained their children access to Britain's loftiest social circles.
Michael Middleton was a flight dispatcher and Carole Goldsmith a flight attendant before they married and, in the 1980s, set up Party Pieces, a business selling balloons, candles, streamers and other mail-order party supplies.
'Very ordinary girl'
They did well enough to move from a semi-detached suburban house to a large home in the affluent village of Bucklebury, with children Kate, now 29, Pippa. now 27 — and her sister's maid of honour — and James, 24. Neighbours speak well of them, guarding the family's privacy. Resident Brian Ward remembered Middleton as "a very ordinary girl" who would pop to the local pub.
The Middletons strove to give their children every advantage in life. The siblings attended Marlborough College, a £30,000 (Dh183,395) a year boarding school attended by some of Britain's wealthiest people. Its alumni include Prince William's cousin, Princess Eugenie.
Kate attended the 600-year-old St Andrews University in Scotland, where fellow students included, fatefully, Prince William, second in line to the throne.
"I think Kate's family journey mirrors that of millions of British people, who have gentrified over the last century," said Claudia Joseph, author of Kate: The Making of a Princess.
