Miles-Bramwell was born in
London and she was adopted whilst a baby. Her adopted parents were Emma Selina and Samuel Birch and they brought her up in
South Normanton in Derbyshire. She went to grammar school but she was obliged to leave when she became pregnant aged fifteen. The child was called Claire and Margaret married Claire's father, Roy Miles, in 1964 when she was 16. She worked in an office, she worked in shops which included stacking supermarket shelves and managing a furniture store. By 1988 there were a thousand Slimming World groups and that number grew to five thousand by 1996. By 2006 she and her husband had bought and transformed a company called Pearl Yachts and they opened a club and restaurant in
Mallorca called the Mood Club. She was awarded an
OBE in 2009 noting her contribution to health and charity. She credited her early success because Slimming World was based around respect where her early rivals relied on humiliation. Her second husband, Tony Whittaker, died in 2021. In 2023 she was recognised as Business Woman of the Year. At the time she also owned a theatre in Majorca as well as Pearl Yachts. Miles-Bramwell died in
Mallorca in 2025. Her funeral cortege passed by her company's headquarters, where 500 people were employed, en route to a funeral in
Derby Cathedral. ==References==