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Sir John Moores : Having millions and all that

The late Ernest Marples, who had been Minister of Transport, and who had also made a large amount of money, said power was the thing: unless a man had tasted real power he had not lived, and the power of money was usually limited. Political power was much more potent.

Money is not fascinating in itself; merely interesting. But I am endlessly fascinated by those who feel compelled to make large amounts of it. What drives them? Is it greed, a game? I had my first lesson in how to keep money when I met Marples. He had a vineyard and fetched two bottles of wine, which he put on the table between us. Having shown me the labels he never offered me a glass. I did not resent it, which is as well; but I find it curious. Much the same thing happened when I travelled to Hambledon to meet Lt. General Sir Guy Salisbury Jones, owner of a vineyard. My role was to provide him with considerable publicity for his product. He suggested a good place to eat in the village, said that, for his part, he would see me after lunch, and kept his wine to himself. I wrote about his wine at great length and often wondered what it tasted like.

Joe Hyman, the textiles millionaire, and one-time boss of Viyella, gave me my second lesson in money. We were travelling together in the back of his Rolls Royce with a TV on the floor which, due to interference, gave every indication of shooting itself in the leg. "Why have you got so much money and I so little?" I asked him, as subtly as I could. It was a quip rather than a serious questi.on, but he took it seriously. ."Well," he said, "you are worth three times as much as you thInk you are and the hard bit is never money, but Idea. If the Idea Is nght, money follows. What do you want to do?" I did not particularly wish to do anything apart from what I was already doing, which was to make a living by talking to people such as him; but I invented something. "Buy a newspaper," I said. "Good," he replied. "Get before you all the titles and choose one you think you can improve most. Then come back to me. I'll put up £30,000 (a largish amount at the time) and you can spend that any way you like, but over that amount, I would ask questions."
I phoned him a fortnight later and said, "I've done it." "Done what?" he said. "Bought a newspaper." "Which one." "The Guardian." "Good, good, and what have you done with it?" "Sacked the lot." "Good, good..." I was lying, of course.

Mythology would have it that millionaires are secretly sad. I have never found it so. I have met a reasonable number of them and they seem happier than most. They can, at least, indulge their fantasies when they get bored. One, who lived in Cheshire, had been inside a textile mill when he was a child and vowed he would have one of his own some day. I met him when he was well established in textiles, but all his manufacturing was abroad. He had bought his English mill, all right, and he maintained it. But it was nothing more than his office. The rest was empty.

I met someone I assumed to be a millionaire in a pub one night and he said, "I'd like to buy your house." He had never been in my house. It was not for sale. I told him so. He said, "sell it to me. Name your price. I haven't done anything interesting all day ."

Millionaires used to be rare. Now they pop up all over the place. They are ten a penny, really. One who will remain unique however many common millionaires there are is Sir John Moores, who won the pools every week because he and his family owned Littlewoods.
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The history of John Moores's beginnings are well, if inadequately, known: began work at 14, invested £50 as his share in a spare-time football pools venture in 1923 ( one of the partners, a clerk, was adopted; his family name was Littlewood, so that name was used). After initial setbacks during which the other two dropped out, brought brother Cecil into the business and was a millionaire before he was 35. The obituaries were heavy with detail and sparse in knowledge. They reflected events rather than the moods that shaped them. It was the humanity of the man that fascinated me. We went out onto the lawn and it was like talking to the chap next door. Moores was not one to harbour conceits, although his convictions suggested that his children might have had reason to be wary of them. Here are extracts from our conversations:

On age -

I'd sooner not tell you. People say to me: He's very good considering how old he is. I think, Christ! Ifl'm no bloody good, say so. I'm 84 but my age is 69. I tell everyone I'm 69. Once you think I'm an old man, I'm finished, aren't I?

The early years, and mother -

My will to succeed was strong. Very strong indeed. I had to succeed. My idea of getting on was to escape poverty. When I was a boy, life was pretty tough. I came from a fairly big family and my mother used to push me hard and say, you must study, and you must do so and so. I left the Post Office when I was 16, still studied, with the idea of making a reasonably comfortable life for myself. If you want to work five or ten per cent harder than the others and give it all you've got you are bound to succeed. You can't help it. We say to our young managers, "If you do a good job you stick out like a sore thumb. If you want an easy life, play billiards, chase girls, it is a very nice way of passing time, but you can not succeed as well."

A store manager is like a football manager. You have to be hard at times, and sometimes you have to be a bastard. I am never frightened to put my hand in the fire. I will come and show you how to do your job. I might not make a success of it, but I might give you some ideas. The big thing is to find what you want to do, isn't it? If my father had been a stockbroker or a cotton merchant, and after the war I had found myself with no trade, I would have been bust, wouldn't I? So by the grace of God I have had an advantage over my sons in that they have not had adversity to sharpen them a little bit. you have got to have your backside kicked a few times. If life is too easy you do not get on.

Painting -

I started painting because I have always admired painters. My son (Peter) married a girl from Naples and I used to go there. Then I went to Las Palmas with a friend, drawing, and we could not speak a word of the language; could not even ask for a beer. I thought: I'll learn a little bit (about the language) and our personnel manager advised me to go to the Berlitz School. They have a card; wherever you go in the world you can have the same lessons, and since then I've never been back painting. But I started learning Spanish and I liked it and I speak it reasonably well, but as a hobby. I f you take it too seriously it becomes work. I'm active. I feel I should do more. Tonight my professor will come about 6.15 to 9.15. I admire my professor. He is trying to improve ways of teaching. He makes little tapes and tries them on me. I know he will never earn a lot of money but he is happy. If you are happy, you are a success. Success is not measured by money. It is the satisfaction you get out of life.

If Goya could feel he had made a real success, fine, but so many of those lads were never quite happy, never quite satisfied with what they did. Cezanne and those people made a far bigger success than I will ever make. I do not want to look down on business, because I think it is an art in itself, and I believe in the profit motive. To me money is not a dirty word. I think it is a marvellous thing to be able to succeed. When you think that our company pays over two million pounds a week in wages, with all the unemployment, surely that's a good thing? Until recently the government were taking six or seven pounds for every pound I made, so if the government could persuade people to make money like I've done it, it would be a good thing for us all, wouldn't it?

I don't ever apologise for having money. The idea of Socialism is good. If we were all perfect human beings willing to help a neighbour all the time -good. But it is not so. I am sorry for deprived people and we have to help them. But when people get after me and say: 'You've made plenty of money,' I say, 'Yes, and you have got to make people try harder.' I want to help others but I am not a saint, by any means. If, on balance, your good acts outweigh your bad acts by four or five to one, you can be quite happy.
In general, I find human beings very adequate. I do not think you have to expect gratitude when you do something. You cast your bread on the waters and hope it will come back.

On football -

If you want a football coach it is no use appointing a golf professional, is it? He has got to have experience, character; be firm but fair. A man who plays favourites is no good, and a man has got to be prepared to do more than the people under him. He has got to show by example.

There is something more than wisdom - nous. You have got to have the common touch, I suppose. Perhaps the biggest thing is to get people to work with you. I would not say I have been hard on my executives. I have heard people say I am a bit of a bastard at times, but I would forgive a man quite a lot of things. If I find ,finally, that he is dishonest mentally and will not think straight, I do not want him. Then I might be hard. I do not believe in people being unlucky; or shall I say, I'd rather have lucky people around me? You make your own luck. It is important to maintain success, to keep on improving. A good boss is a man who can make good employees out of bad, and some can not.

My aim in life was to make Everton champions and they were champions (under his chairmanship ). As a boy, I played football. I played until I was 45. When I stopped playing I would watch Dixie Dean. I am a great football spectator

On retirement-

Once I decided to retire as chairman of the Littlewood organisation a few years ago it was like a sense of death. It took a while to get used to.

On happiness-

I don't smoke. I drink only wine with meals; very little whisky. I generally drink gin. Not that I am against drink. It is a great pity that wherever you go people want to give you alcohol. I think it has ruined a lot of men's lives. That again, my mother taught me. She wanted to make me a Band of Hope person. If I go out and people want to give me sherry before dinner, and wine with dinner, and I used to like a drop of Cognac after, then you can easily become an alcoholic, you know? I do not drink in the middle of the day. I do not drink much Cognac these days so I suppose I am really abstemious. I am getting old. Remember, I have only got five senses and the only way to enjoy life is to keep those senses pure and good. If I smoke I am dulling my senses. If I drink too much I am dulling my senses. From now on I am living on borrowed time, so J. must keep those five senses very active.

Many years ago, I decided one of the ways to be happy was to simplify my desires. If I started thinking of all the nice women in the world, of all the yachts in the world, it would be an empty kind of life. I have tried to simplify my desires, which is to run a business, play sport and keep a fairly fit body. I thought: Now, John, do not start wanting unnecessary things. To me it would be an absolute sin to even try a drug, yet many people now think that is the way. It gives you a kick, a new sensation. I do not want them or anything that will interfere with my thoughts. I play bridge on Sunday with my brother (Cecil): always the same four people because I know we will not quarrel. I suppose I am a bit too rooted and introvert, aren't I? Anyway, I enjoy life. Who's Who wanted. all kinds of things; so much that I refused to give it to them. So many tiny little things. I am a kind of contradiction in that I believe in publicity for our business, but you have to have a little personal privacy.

On life-

I regard human life almost like the flame of a candle. The flame is always changing. It is a good job we do die off and become nothing. Last year's flowers have to die to allow this year's to come. So whether I am part of a future life, I do not know. I am not interested. I want to do the best I can and enjoy myself and help others. First, to enjoy myself, remember. My first job is to John Moores, then to my family, then to my immediate surroundings, then to the rest. I would not pretend, ever, that my own aim in life is to help my neighbour. No, no, no. When I get up in a morning I have got to enjoy today. It is eleven o' clock now. I have got to enjoy this next three or four minutes. That is why I am drinking tea and eating biscuits, because I like doing it...

His will was revealed in December, 1993: the founder of the £1.5 billion Littlewoods organisation, reported the Daily Telegraph, left £9,954,642 net (£10,208,599 gross), but the full extent of his estate was not disclosed. The 19-page will, made in 1988, left assets in Bermuda not included in his estate in Britain, but gave no details of his "Bermudian property."

John Moores was not unique in making one million pounds, or even many millions. But he was unusual in that money for its own sake was not particularly attractive to him. The Moores clan is large. It tends to come into prominence only at times of births, weddings or tragedies. Some members of it, as we have seen, have worked closely in the Littlewood organisation with John Moores. It can not have been easy, given the founder's unique style and point of vIew.

 

 

 

Geoffrey Mather © 2004

14 January, 2006

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