COVER STORY
‘ITDOESN’TMATTERWHAT YOU’RESELLING, PEOPLEAREGOINGTOBUY INTOTHE
PERSONASMUCHAS THEBRAND. THEBEST CONVERSATIONALIST IS THELISTENER’
Bill Cullen copped on from an early age
that success is achieved through hard work and putting in the hours. Itwas his first salaried jobworking in a garage and he vol- unteered to man the petrol pumps at 6am, although he wasn’t due to start until 8am. “The captains of industry are out and about at that hour in the
morning. I got to know the likes of Michael Smurfit’s father and a prominent barrister who I supplied with rose buds for his button hole frommymother’s stall.These people didn’t get their money easy.Most successful people made it by working and that’s it. “You’ve got to be positive and love what you’re doing. If you
don’t,make it something you want to do.That’s what I’ve been able to do.” At the age of 14Cullen got the job sweeping floors and clean-
ingwindows in theDublin FordDealership and eight years later, in 1964, he wasmademanaging director. Howdid that happen? “Iwent in there and said, ‘Iwill do any-
thing you give me quicker and better than anyone else.’While working as the mail boy I overheard the boss saying he needed someone to do the wages. I volunteered, and the 120 employees were paid quicker than before and the person who had been doing that job didn’t come back. “I had been doingmental arithmetic on the street since I was
five or six when my mother used to get me to check boxes of oranges and apples. “Achieving success is about realising howmuch you really can
do.Forget about tea breaks and all that crap.The earlier you learn this lesson the better. I used to go to the fruit markets at five in themorning before school and buy boxes of fruit and twomorn- ings aweek I’d get the 5amtrain toHowthwithmy brother and we’d buy fish directly fromthe captains of the trawlers.” After running the FordDealership,Cullen took over the trou-
bled Renault CarDistribution franchise fromWaterford Crys- tal in 1986 and turned the company around before going on to write best-selling books and establishing theEuropaAcademy in Swords.He’s probably best known at themoment as the boss in theTV3 version of The Apprentice.
GOING FOR GOALS
Cullen sayswhile hewas grafting as a teenager he didn’t visualise becoming a millionaire but he did set himself particular goals. “Mymother toldme there was nothing I couldn’t do and asked mewhat Iwanted in life. I said Iwanted to runmy own business – I didn’t knowinwhat line,but I liked cars – and Iwanted a big
18 OWNER MANAGER VOL 3 ISSUE 4 2010
house.Therewere 15 of us living in one roomwith no bathroom. Mymother gotme to write allmy dreams down. “In business you have to continually keep sight of what you’re
trying to achieve – that’s where a lot of people fall down. You need a plan of action.As an employee this meant for me being the last person in the company the boss would want to fire. In 1956, the boss let 60 of his 70 staff go and I was one of the ones that he kept on. “I asked years laterwhat itwas he sawinme tomakemeMD
at 22.He said he saw the light on in the garage one night when he was going home. I was working at 1am to get all the finish- ing statements to customers before month end and told him I was going to drop the envelopes into theGPOonmyway home on the bike. ItwasNewYear’sEve and he told hiswife therewas a young fellow looking after his business like nobody else was.” With this in mind, one of the questions Cullen always asks
since is, ‘how can you get staff to see things with the owner’s eyes?’
ADDRESSING THE RECESSION
It was a phrase at the forefront of hismind in the past two years as he had tomake tough decisions to survive the recession, par- ticularly as the industry hewas operating inwas one of theworst hit – in 2009, the car salesmarket was down by two thirds com- pared to the previous year. Things are picking up now,helped by the Scrappage Scheme.
The number of new cars sold in the first eight months of 2010 jumped 50pc from the same period last year to 79,145, accord- ing to the official registration statistics from the Society of the IrishMotor Industry. “We cut staff levels by 30pc, but thankfully half of the people
we let go are back this year.We cut pay by 10pc,which was very emotive, and was one thing we learned had never happened be- fore. During the Celtic tiger we ran away with ourselves salary wise.Salaries in Ireland are still too high,particularlywhen com- pared withNorthern Ireland,”Cullen says. However, he is keen to stress that cost-cutting alone is not
the answer. “In the dealerships we set up one of our individ- uals as a ‘forensic bottom-line optimiser’. He looks at costs, but,more importantly, talks to everyone in the company about innovative ways of increasing revenues,market share or profit margins. If you keep pruning a tree it will die. You have to look for the sunshine, looking at things like up-selling, selling services we never pushed before, knocking on doors, ringing
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