Warren Buffett's Daughter-in-Law Thought She'd Get 'Free Candy' When She Married His Son – Turns Out, 'There Was No Free Candy With Warren'

Mary Buffett might not have left her marriage with a lifetime of See’s Candies. Still, she did gain something equally valuable: an insider’s perspective on Warren Buffett’s investing genius. 

Married to Warren’s son, Peter, from 1980 to 1993, Mary wasn’t just an observer; she absorbed the legendary investor’s philosophies and made them her own, eventually turning her experience into a successful career as an author, speaker and educator.

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In a 2019 ThinkAdvisor interview, Mary Buffett offered a glimpse into what it was like to be the daughter-in-law of the billionaire ‘Oracle of Omaha.’

In the early days, Mary had little idea how singular Warren’s approach to life – and gift-giving – would be. When she joined the Buffett family, she admits she assumed perks like endless See’s Candies would be part of the package. “When I married him, the only thing I knew was that his father owned See’s Candies,” she recalled. “So when we got married, I was like, great – free candy! Never knowing that there was no free candy with Warren.” Instead of sweets, Mary got a front-row seat to the value-investing strategies that have defined Warren’s career.

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Though she’d already had a solid foundation in business from her work at Columbia Records to running music publishing at Hugh Hefner’s company, Warren’s relentless focus on investing soon became a major influence in her life. 

Mary says that investing was pretty much all he talked about. She shared in the interview, “That’s all he talked about! A couple of times a year we’d go to Omaha and he’d come home and get right on the phone, talking to either Mrs. [Katharine] Graham of the Washington Post or Stan Lipsey [publisher] of The Buffalo News [which Buffett bought in 1977]. He’d be on the phone when you were in the den with him.”

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Holidays with the Buffetts were a mini business summit, where conversations with industry titans flowed over dinner instead of eggnog. “When the family got together in Laguna over Christmastime, all the industry titans would be there: We’d have lunches and dinners and they’d all talk about companies. Investing was the only thing Warren ever talked about!” she said.

All that immersion in the investing world paid off for Mary. Inspired by Warren’s success and principles, she built her unique career. Today, she’s an international speaker and bestselling author of multiple books on Warren Buffett’s investment strategies. Her first book, Buffettology, was published in 1997 and became a massive success, leading to a series of books. Her latest, 7 Secrets to Investing Like Warren Buffett, offers readers an accessible entry point into Warren’s world of value investing.

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Mary’s takeaways from her years with the Buffetts come down to timeless principles: patience, discipline and the value of understanding the people behind a business. “The biggest part was watching his discipline and patience and not doing things quickly,” she explained. “He’d conduct research and understand the people who were running a company. All of that mattered so much to his success.”

While Mary may not have left the marriage with free chocolate, her time with Warren ultimately gave her something sweeter: the knowledge to build a career helping others understand one of the world’s greatest investors.

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