Season #3, Episode #7 - In conversation with Richard Smothers

From Warwick to Tesco: Shaping a Finance Career in UK Retail Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Assumptions Podcast, Manny here. And today, I'm delighted to announce that I'm joined by a very special guest in Richard Smothers, former CFO of Mothercare and Green King with many years of experience in senior finance roles at Tesco across the globe. Richard, how are you? Speaker 2 I'm good, Manny, thank you. And I'm very excited to be joining you here today for your Your Assumptions podcast. Speaker 1 Very happy to have you now, Richard, we're going to be unpacking your long and illustrious career today and looking at all of your different roles throughout your career. But before we start looking at your actual career, I want to talk about your time in full time education. Much like many of us, you also went to the University of Warwick to study economics and my question to you was how did this shape the eventual career trajectory that you went on? Were there any stand out experiences or conversations that you had which influenced you in terms of what industry you wanted to go into? Or was this just a natural path that you took? Speaker 2 Well, it's the other way around, money. I decided some time ago that I wanted to go into finance. I was kind of really interested in commerce and and business and I chose a degree that I thought would help me the best and Warwick University came out top of the list. I actually studied accounts in financial analysis where it was a big part of that. But what really attracted me was Warwick's rich heritage with his Business School, really great professors. And in particular, the course I was interested in was much more around financial analysis and commerce rather than, let's call it traditional bookkeeping, accounting. And my experience at Warwick sort of filled that appetite with the desire to go into into business. And that's what I did when I left Warwick back in 1988, although it seems like a very long time ago. Speaker 1 And in terms of you actually entering the industry, how did this come about then? What was your first job? Speaker 2 Yeah, so I was keen to go work in a business where finance was already established and I was really lucky actually. I interviewed for some kind of audit firms and didn't really get on or like what I, what I heard that I went to go to a company quite a long way from anywhere really in Herefordshire called Sun Valley Poultry at the time, which is part of the Cargill sort of conglomerate. And I really liked what they did with, with finance. Finance was a really integral part of business and I started my career there as a graduate trainee and stayed there nine years and finished off looking after a division as a divisional controller. Speaker 1 Fascinating and obviously a big part of your early career was your involvement with Tesco. Within a decade of being within the industry you found yourself at Tesco, soon after which you became Tesco's Finance Director of UK Operations. Could you just tell us about how this opportunity came about, what your role entailed on a day-to-day basis, and what enticed you to take up this opportunity? Driving Growth and Efficiency in Tesco's UK Retail Business What was interesting at the time I I was looking, I mean I've been at Cargill for, for nine years and I was keen to move to something new and different and retail wasn't that exciting in those days. Interestingly, you know, Tesco's, I was asked the question why go and work for a shop? But what I saw with Tesco at the time was a real change in the way the business has been set up. Terry Leahy had just been appointed as the CEO for Tesco. Andrew Higginson had just joined as the Chief Financial Officer and they both talked about wanting to commercialize finance in the business, something I've been doing really well within Cargill at Sun Valley. And I thought I could take my learnings and, and demonstrate that in a new environment. And you know, I'd always been heavily involved in on the ground operations and that's what Tesco's looking for. And I, I quickly moved through property and then to UK operations and, and I was accountable in UK operations for the financial management of Tesco's stores and distribution in the UK working with the, the kind of Chief Operating officer called David Potts. And if you follow retail, David became the CEO of Morrison's a few years later. And, and it was really about providing financial control, financial analysis, business decision support to what Tesla was doing at the time. And that was all about growing the UK, driving profitability and making the business much more efficient. And in my time, you know, I looked after the operations programme about driving productivity efficiency across both the stores and also the group supply chain, distribution centres, trucks and sheds. Speaker 1 And were there any particular domestic challenges that you faced during the stint or was it relatively plain sailing? Speaker 2 Well, I think Tesco was in its growth phase. So you know, there was certainly lots of competition out there, you know, from Asda and Sainsbury's. It was a very competitive market. Therefore you have to be really spot on with pricing. You had to be really spot on with your customer offer. You know, when I was there it was great because Tesco went first with online retailing. It went first with what in front, you know, the famous pledge about no more, no more than one customer at the checkouts in front and it and it also was the first to introduce self-service checkouts to make the business much more efficient for customers. So it's a really customer LED business with a strong financial backing and as a finance person you learn a lot by making your business much more efficient but for customers and Tesco really LED that. Navigating Volatility as CFO of Tesco Lotus in Thailand Yeah. Well, following this role, you're also CFO of Tesco Lotus in Thailand. Obviously, in 1997 the well known Asian financial crisis took place. For those who don't know, this started in Thailand and spread across East and Southeast Asia when the government was forced to devalue it's currency after running out of foreign reserves to defend against speculative attacks. For context, at this period of time many Asian countries had fixed exchange rates tying their currency to the US dollar. Ultimately, this triggered crashes throughout the continent and caused banking crises and severe recessions, and it required IMF intervention to help out. Obviously, you operated within Thailand between 2006 to 2010, not too long after the crisis, during a particularly volatile period itself. So my question to you was what was the impact of the crisis upon your role? How much do you think it differ because of this taking place? Obviously the growth rate of Thailand was severely volatile at this period in time. And how much harder did it make different elements of your role such as forecasting, and did it also alter the level of risk that the corporation was willing to take within the region at the period of time? Speaker 2 Well, it's interesting because the financial crash, you're obviously right, happened in 9798. That's when Tesco bought the business in Thailand. So it provides a great opportunity to enter a market at relatively good value. But then Tesco took the decision to grow the business. Modern retail was new in Thailand. It was very traditional retail, so, you know, small shops, not a big offer. And Tesco really modernised the market. So between 2006 and 2010, you know, we grew the top line of the business by 60%. We grew the the profit of the business, the cash by 100% and really modernized and LED the modernization of retail, both in big hypermarkets but also in small shops. It was challenging though. There's a couple of things. When I was there, we had H1N1, which was a variation of avian flu in Asia at that time. So, you know, many years later, my COVID experience was already tested because I've already been through it. And there was lots of constitutional crises in Thailand when I was there. I can recall within a few months of moving there with my family, I, I received a call from somebody back in the UK saying we've seen they've got tanks on the streets, what's going on? And we, we suffered quite major constitutional challenges. So, so managing the crisis, managing volatility, looking at how you predict your sales, how you grow your business became, became really challenging. Having said all that, having the backing of a very large international player allowed you to access funds. We were able to raise debt in Thailand very effectively because you were a safe haven. And therefore we were able to play to our strengths. And as as a result, the business group was incredibly successful. And you know, I, I really enjoyed my time as CFO out there. That was the I had a team that was entirely tied to the decision to have no experts in my team. And you learn an awful lot with managing businesses and managing people who aren't sort of from your normal demography. So I had a great experience, lovely business and came back very different, more experienced fan and professional. Operating in Asia: Consumer Behavior, Crisis Resilience, and Regulatory Challenges Sounds great. One thing that economists often touch on amidst crisis is crisis memory, so the impact of this upon consumer behaviour. There's a lot of level of psychology at play when economic decisions are made. Did you notice any significant changes in consumer behaviour as a result of these fluctuating periods of growth? Or do you think that within your industry specifically, consumer behaviour wasn't altered by too much? Speaker 2 I think in in retail consumer behaviour is it changes all the time. You know people talk about long term trends but it changes almost daily or weekly. So you know an event yesterday can affect trading tomorrow. So managing forecasting, managing products supply, managing labour are critically important. So I think you see more acutely in a food retail business, you know, so the business is daily, you know, if I go back to my UK days, you know, I used to have a call on a Thursday every week that would dictate what product went into shop on Saturday and it could change, you know, the weather could change, a sport event could change. So being fleet to foot is really important in that kind of environment. But you can take it from industry to industry with you. Speaker 1 Well, we hear a lot about the financial crisis of 2008 from a Western perspective, but obviously at the time you were in Thailand with Lotus and then you eventually moved on to become financial director of Tesco's operations in Asia as a whole in 2010. So what was your experience of the whole situation from an Asian perspective and did you see this coming? And if so, how did you plan to tackle the crisis? Speaker 2 It's hard to see it coming because it was driven initially from the US, but I think course Asia had been through the big crash back in 97. It was somewhat more resilient. So it'd been through, had had sort of muscle memory. A lot of the management teams that I worked with, the banks I worked with had experienced it. And I think what they, what they recognised very quickly, because it was a like a Western crisis that became, came to Asia. It wasn't an Asian crisis per SE. Their, their ability to respond was quite robust. And actually I was surprised how consumers were much more relaxed about it than maybe I thought they would have been. But again, it's all muscle memory. They, they'd been through it before and it wasn't as bad as it was previously. Again, access to funds in Asia was short for a short period of time, but that's then opened up very, very. Speaker 1 Quickly. So would you say, I mean you've touched on it, but would you say it's more so a Western crisis than a global crisis because of. Speaker 2 It certainly felt. It certainly felt that way. It certainly felt. And the big failings were mainly U.S. banks. A lot of the capital constraints that came into place were mainly US and European banks and and the Asians had been much more prudent because what had happened back in 97 as a consequence that that my experience was that their funds availability, their their kind of their, their buffers were naturally bigger anyway. Speaker 1 So in terms of financial performance from Tesco Lotus's perspective, were you able to withstand any issues and still drive on? Speaker 2 Them, yeah, I think the underlying economic sort of growth in that part of the world and that wasn't just in Thailand, but Malaysia, certainly China at the time with less so Japan, certainly India. There was such a big shift into modern retail. I go into an air conditioning shop to a full range of products at great price and you can guarantee it will be there. That shift continued throughout that period of time and as a consequence all those markets grew really strongly. You had to navigate the the bumps in the road. So crisis management is really important, but they all grew through that period of time. Speaker 1 And just finally on your time at Tesco, expanding on your role as financial director of Tesco's operations in Asia as a whole, in terms of your Asian experiences, how did it differ from UK when contemplating the involvement of the state? Obviously the state is a lot more involved within the economy in Asia, in certain countries like China for example. So in terms of this and regulatory compliance, did this work in a different manner to the UK and were there greater obstacles it? Speaker 2 It it did in two ways. 1 is the regulations were ever changing and therefore not not consistent nor were they clear. They're also much more interpretationable so you they weren't as black and white as they were in the UK law. Although UK law is all mainly case law not written down in books. You could go back to reference points. The second thing was, and this unfortunately probably still prevalent today, there's a much higher degree of what I'll call low scale corruption in those markets. So it was possible to bend rules. Now for a big Western player, your rule book is very clearly defined, Your value set is really clearly defined. And so, you know, if a local official says, well, actually you can get that that site away if you do something that isn't quite appropriate, our response is always I'm really sorry, the answer is no. Whereas a local player, of course, will play about different rules. So actually it wasn't just about the rules themselves. It was how a Western organization navigates a a an environment, which is much more is much grayer. And that that didn't mean you'd walk away from operations and opportunities, then maybe a local player would do so many may quite hard to operate sometimes. Becoming a PLC CFO and Embracing Global Business Cultures at Wrexham Thank. Speaker 1 You Well following your work with Tesco, you moved on to work for Wrexham in 2011 as the Director of Group Violence. For those who aren't aware, Wrexham is a British based multinational consumer packaging corporation. What essentially attracted you to this project and what were some of your favorite memories from operating within this team? Speaker 2 So, so listen, I'd, I'd been in Tesco for 14 years, been ACFO for five years, but my ambition was always to be a PLCA Public Limited company CFO. And I was given some guidance early on that said you had to be, you had to be either very, very lucky to step up into a PLCCFO role from a kind of #2 or you had to go work in a central PLC function. So I went to Wrexham almost deliberately to fill out my career. So, you know, managing a group and Wrexham was a FTSE 100 at the time. So a big, big corporation, very global. And so managing the kind of reporting to the city, managing the audit function, managing and lauded working closely tax and treasury in a complex group was all part of my experience. I think what I enjoyed most about my time in Wrexham was exposure to other parts of the world. So you know, I've become, if not an Asia expert, certainly Asia knowledgeable. And luckily with Tesco, I'd worked in almost every Asian market one could think about either directly or indirectly. But I had little experience of the the Americas. My experience the Americas was very much kind of Cargill head office, which is very removed in my time at Sun Valley. And my European experience is very angerfiled. You know, I was deep annoyed UK but didn't really have much with with Europe. Wrexham was a global business. We had 130 when I joined, 132 factories, only two was in the UK. You know, I, I lived in a pretty much an ivory tower in West London, but I spent most of my time travelling to North America, South America and Europe. And therefore learning how businesses done in different cultures, how you take your core skills but have to work with different environments was just a wonderful experience. And I and I met some amazing people, learnt a lot about, you know, how you do business differently in Northern Europe versus Southern Europe, Learnt about how when you do business in, in South America, in Brazil, they always think and always believe they can make your idea better. So just just go with it. And and then how North America is so, so rock solid. So I just learned about culture and about landing things differently, different people more than technical, actually. And I would and I would encourage anybody in their careers if they give the ability to live abroad like I did in Asia or to work with other cultures outside of your home culture. You will learn so much about how to get things done. And there's not one route. There are many routes to the right answer and it helps you get land things by understanding those cultures in different environments. Wrexham's Oligopolistic Model and the Ball Corporation Acquisition Well, looking at your involvement with Wrexham from a microeconomic standpoint, it's obviously a market which has a lot less operators. And as opposed to your earlier rather different experiences, how different was financial strategy making when operating in a more oligopolistic industry rather than the competitor retail market? Speaker 2 I'm glad you said that. Not me. You know, it's, I, I think it was, it's a very different model. So when you, in a retail market, you know, and in a food market, your, your decisions, you take to death, vet your outcomes tomorrow and it's very, very quick. You can launch products and change them within a week in a retail environment. With, with Wrexham, I mean, Wrexham was, was a packaging business, but really focused heavily on beverage cans and you're making long term bets. So, you know, a, a, a factory would cost between 50 and $80 million. So that's one point. And so you had to work on very long term relationships for long term deals. So you know, if you think about the types of customers that a Rexum would engage with, you know who who consumes cans, PepsiCo, the Coca-Cola, the big Brewers and actually you would do long term deals in market deals been 5 or 10 years. So you had to have the right plants in the right place. Now, interestingly, they couldn't switch. So if you, you know, a really good example is with Wrexham, they, they have or had a manufacturing plant in Wakefield in the UK, OK, that was next door to a big Coke filling plant and they had a hole in the wall where the cans went through the wall into the Coke plant. It was that close. So if you think about it, once you've got that contract, Coke can't say to you, well, I'll tell you what we don't want. You will go within your competitors because they can't physically supply, it's too expensive. So it's about long term relationships with customers. It's about being thinking about where they're going with their development of their products. You know, being innovative and then being super cost effective, but once you're committed, you're locked in. And that's very different to retail. You know, retail if you probably understand your money, if a shop down the road is a bit cheaper and you're doing your weekly shop, you know, spreading your, your, your student loan. You will happily drive past Tesco or walk past Tesco, get the bus pass Tesco to go to ALDI. Speaker 1 Yeah, it. Speaker 2 Is even though it's further away, you know, because it's cheaper in, in manufacturing, you can't do that because the cost of doing so is so prohibitively expensive. And that's a very, very different model. Speaker 1 Ultimately, in 2015 Wrexham was involved in an acquisition with Bull Corporation which is valued at approximately £4.3 billion. This combined two of the world's largest beverage can manufacturers and marked the end of Wrexham as an independent UK listed company. So I just wanted to ask you about your involvement in all of this and why this deal occurred from Wrexham's perspective and more So what your role as a senior financial official was to facilitate the deal. Speaker 2 So Susan, I was, I was coming to the end of my time in Wrexham when the deal was done. So I didn't leave because the deal was done and and it was all about economies of scale. So you know, factories are big, overheads are big. There was opportunity to factory capacity at the time in certain markets was over overreach so they could consolidate facilities. My involvement was very much about preparing for the communication of the sale. So the deal was done on the day Wrexham announced its full year results. So I was running two and the deal wasn't guaranteed, so I was running two sets of books to announce with the sale without a sell in the final run. And I think, you know, the, the Ball model is different to Wrexham. It's an incorporated U.S. business. But having said that, the people I keep in contact with, Wrexham said It was a really great deal for them and many of the people stayed with stayed with Ball following the transaction. Speaker 1 Well, following your time at Wrexham, between 2015 to 2017, you operated as the CFO of Mothercare. Mothercare's Decline: Brexit, Online Shift, and the Future of High Street Retail Obviously, everyone knows Mothercare, well known global brands specialized in providing products for parents with young children. When you came into the corporation, it was amidst the rise of transitions to online services with Amazon increasing in power and exerting increasing dominance over physical retailers. And the Mothercare also faced a few structural challenges. There were also declining UK birth rates at the time. So from structural perspective, it wasn't the most ideal situation. Do you think that by the time you came into the corporation that UK High Street retailers were already in irreversible decline? Speaker 2 It's difficult the, the business, we just refinanced the business and, and you're right, Mothercare have been a stalwart on the High Street for, for decades, you know, and been there a long time. And there was a recognition that online has become a bigger part. They just hired a new CEO chap called Mark Jones. He was the guy who'd taken the Littlewoods catalog, which you put far too young to remember, but was a physical Catholic where you bought things to become shop direct. So they made it into a completely online business and the the model for the UK, the UK had been losing money for about 10 years, but it had a very good international franchise business. Yeah. The, the, the view was that there was still a demand for an experience and advice for mums and, and, and dads and grandparents in this space. And although birth rates were dropping, first birth rates weren't. And actually Mothercare was a very much a first time, you know, a first time parent, which if you've got children, you get to your second, your third one, you know the ropes. The first one's always a bit scary. And the view was to modernize the business, big investment in the store infrastructure. We closed out lots of stores and we put it, we drove the model to be about the experience of helping you in your journey with your first baby rolling, just transacting. We also drove the business to 50% online and actually at the point I decided to leave after a couple of years, the UK business was in profit, the business was 50% online. We'd refurbished all the stores and we'd re established our relationships with our international partners. Unfortunately, something happened between me deciding to leave and leaving, and that's Brexit. So, so many people argue about the the rights and wrongs of Brexit. The one thing that's a fact is that at the point of Brexit, the pound devalued material that you recall divided by between 10 and 15%. And the problem with the Mothercare model was although we had great service, all the goods bought in Mothercare were all bought internationally, all bought in dollars. So yeah, sure, for the next 6 to 12 months, I'd already fixed prices, so contracted out and hedged out, which you'd be familiar with on dollar. But EBD could see that beyond that period of time, the cost of goods would rise by between 10 and 15% because you had Amazon in the market and they were transacting and paying basically little or no tax. Their cost of operating was materially cheaper. And actually their ability to not pass that through to customers was very, very good. Mother Care and Fortesy couldn't not pass the cost through to customers and as a consequence, you know, customers weren't prepared to pay the 10 to 15%. I mean, interestingly, and this is like post event, you know, my, I'm a grandfather. So my, my I've got a granddaughter. My daughter said to me, it's such a share out mother cakes. I've got nowhere to go for advice. But she's exactly the model of people who went to Amazon and bought things cheaper. So people weren't prepared, they wanted the advice but wanted it free. And as a result the, the UK, after I'd left before the UK business couldn't sustain the operating cost of running a fully serviced business. And I think what you've seen is those retails on the High Street who are very experiential, very service LED, where they're able to charge a premium price have sustained themselves. But if you're a mass, mass retailer where you offer nothing else other than I think it's Amazon or eBay or, or all the other plethora of my retailers, you know, more recently shown, you know, it's very hard to stain your business. It's also not helped by the rate structure in the UK, so where property taxes are charged on, on retail, physical retail, but not charged on digital sales. And as a consequence, the cost in business in the UK and the High Street is incredibly difficult unless you have something which is so unique or so experiential where online can't deliver that. Speaker 1 So where do you see the future of high St. retailers like Mothercare going there? Do you think it's a downward trajectory? Speaker 2 I think it's a downward trajectory unless they reset, unless the government reset the rates, property tax, infrastructure, it's very, very hard to sustain High Street retail. So unless you have something which is very, very specialist where consumers want either the experience of visiting your shops because it's something different or where you can't replicate that product online, I think it will, it will decline. I think the only saving grace is probably around, although it's less important now, it would appear than it was maybe 2-3 years ago, is around sustainability. I think High Street businesses are able to sustain product flows better than online because they're not cheap. You know, they're not looking to source at the cheapest price. But I think the High Street will continue to decline less. There is a structural change in the tax regime. Greene King's Transition to Private Ownership and Long-Term Investment So finally, in 2017, you moved to Green King, Christian's second largest pub operator and you became CFO, operating in this role until April of last year. In 2019, Green King was acquired by CK Asset Holdings. So my question to you is, how does the financial philosophy of a corporation differ when a public company becomes privately owned? Speaker 2 So, so in many ways, the operations of the business haven't really changed, but the, the expectations have. So, you know, I, I enjoyed the business and Green King's a great business. You're right. It's the second largest pub Co and it's the largest integrated pub Brewer, so it brews beer as well in the UK, rich heritage, you know, 100 and 100, you know, over almost 200 years old now and have grown from being a regional player to being a national player. And the pub sector is national. It's not there's no international players in the pub sector. So I joined the business that was hugely profitable, shooting cash generative and was a really strong yield. So for those who don't know, you know, you measure business in two ways. One is through growth and capital value, and one is through the dividend you pay. And Green King was a very good yielder. He paid a very good dividend. And guess what? It's shareholders love that. It's almost like a guaranteed income every year. In 2019, there was a change of guard at CEO and that was a time that CK Assets decided to invest in the market. And for those who don't know, and it's worthwhile just Googling the business CK Assets and they're three separate businesses, CK Assets, CK Hutchinson and CK Infrastructure, all listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange for all public businesses, but all with a common the private shareholder structure behind them by a chap called Lee Carl Shing, who is one of Asia's richest men. And it's an interesting story. It should you take the time to read and I'm sure you can link in the podcast their their websites. They are long term investors. So although my shareholders in Green King as APLC were very sticky, if they liked me, they were very good shareholders. Like the yield, ultimately they were driven by relatively medium, short, medium term financial decisions. So if somebody else could have driven a bit of yield or somebody else of a better capital growth, they could have moved their shareholdings quite easily. Very liquid stock. CK assets have a very, very long term view. By long term I mean almost infinite. So they take they they take a very, very long term philosophical view that you know the keen on that the performance of the year. I are you generating sufficient cash to manage your own investment? But then they take a long term yield really long term. I mean, if you said to me what's long, I'm thinking 20-30 years. Yeah. And their perspective is that they hold businesses that they think will create value over a long term and help them spread their risk globally. So COVID came along literally months after they took over the business. They hadn't predicted it clearly. And we were well prepared, partly because they're Asian and they saw months before anybody in the UK thought it was real. But also as as I mentioned previously, I'd lived through AH1N1 crisis in Thailand. I understood what a pandemic and actually practiced A pandemic live. And we were well prepared as a business, but important they took a long term view. So, you know, they said to us, you know, do your best to protect cash, but don't stop investment, protect your people. Whatever you do, don't make short term decisions that you may have to as APLC that my, my, my competitors had to. So we continue to invest through COVID, We invest in our transformational change. We, we put our teams on full furlough period of time. Yes, we have some government support, but full furlough we made, you know, bear in mind the business employs 36,000 people. There's only a handful of people thinking of 10s of people made redundant through the whole period of time. And we were closed for over a year. And we're able to do that because of our backing with our shareholder so closely aligned to our value set long term, you know, I know my competitors in APLC or PE world have to close lots of shops, people redundant and make some very short term decisions. I was protected from that. So as ACFO, I continue with my strategic intervention rather than having to make very short term decisions. And that ultimately means that business is a much better place for for the future. Government Support and Effective Crisis Management During COVID-19 And just touching on COVID, how critical was government intervention to Green King survival? You've obviously talked about the firm being very successful. Do you think the furlough scheme in business, Business Rates Relief really supported you or was it more so your planning? Speaker 2 Yeah, I, I think, you know, survival, no, because of the nature of the business and the structure of the business. The banks were also incredibly supportive. We have to bear in mind is the pub sector is and the reason why CK were interested is property, you know, so the, you know, this is bricks, A bricks and mortar business. I have 2600 pubs valued at, you know, 4 1/2 billion pounds. It's like your house, you know, and you've got no income, you've still got your house. And we still had our pubs. And even though they weren't generating income at that point in time, furlough was great because it allowed us to maintain a full team. Although we did pay people, we top people up, so we didn't just pay them. Furlough protect jobs and it also allowed, you know, us to continue to invest in the future growth of the business. The Rachel Relief didn't really help Green King per SE, but did help our tenants. So of our 2600 pubs of thousands are tenanted and that really helped them survive. They would have, although we did help them, you know, we managed the way in which we didn't charge rent, we had rent holidays throughout period of time. Furlough and rates really help them sustain their businesses and they are stronger for it. So I think government intervention was what was important and helpful at the time. I think what was less helpful was the navigation and the rule making through COVID. So, you know, the clarity of thoughts, managing through a crisis wasn't as good. And as a result, rules were inconsistent, changing frequently. So on some things, I'd say the government scored 8 out of 10. On many things, they scored one or two out of 10. And we all know about some of the chaos that happened in, in, in government during that period of time. What we did as a business, we formed our crisis team day one. And you know, I'd like to think that, you know, we manage wealth through crisis. In fact, if you go onto the Green King website, we actually more for our teams actually published a our life through crisis. And if you go onto the website, you'll see there is a, a book that we published that says how we manage through crisis. And it's apart from I've got my picture in it, which is not a good picture. It's worth the reads. It helps you understand how organizations manage and some of the challenges through a crisis situation. And inevitably many, we're going to have more crises, not less, I suspect, going going forward. And that skill set is really important for, you know, future people like yourself to get your head around to be successful, I think. Final Advice: Consumer Focus, Resilience, and Future Career Success Well, thank you so much for your input. Richard, before I let you go, I have one last question. We've only got 3 minutes left, but you've worked in a variety of sectors, you know, retail, packaging, hospitality, and you faced a lot of financial crisis crises. Which of these sectors do you think is most exposed to macroeconomic shocks and which is most resilient to them? Speaker 2 You know, it's funny, I think they're all exposed in different ways. So that the thing that joins all my career together and it's really the bit I've enjoyed the most is the connection with consumers. So you know, whether it's been in food manufacturing, whether it's been in food retail, non food retail, hospitality, or even even packaging for food products hits consumers. So they're all volatile, they're all open to macroeconomic challenges. I think my, my one piece of advice, and actually it's sometimes missed, typically finance people is start with the consumer, start with the customer. If you really understand your customers rising, the consumer, no matter how hard it can get, you can respond in the right way. And then secondly, make sure your business model is efficient, as efficient as it can be. And there's lots of opportunities to do do that. If you do those two things, you will succeed. Your, your form might shape, it might change, but you'll succeed. And, you know, I think the best way to do that and my advice to any, any graduate is the best way to do it. A good experience in life, spreadsheets, books, research is great. You know, the one thing that's set my career aside is I've always been interested in going and talking to consumers, being out in the business. And I'd really encourage any graduate to go and do the same as an employer. A graduate who can understand what your customers are going through first hand will bring a different insight to the intellect in the conversation than somebody who doesn't. Speaker 1 OK, well that wraps up a fascinating episode of the Assumptions Podcast. Richard, thank you so much for coming on. It was a real pleasure to delve into your career experiences and gain insight on such a stark variety of happenings. So I truly appreciate chatting to you. I hope everyone's enjoyed listening. Thank you for now and goodbye.