Women’s Wear Daily interview
Branson discusses the first Virgin Hotel, set to open in Chicago on January 15, in an interview with Women’s Wear Daily.
We had been looking at a number of properties for our first location but what truly excited us about Chicago were the friendly people and also the building. The Old Dearborn Bank really captured our attention with its 1920s architecture, and gave us the challenge to restore many of its existing features and give it a second life. Not too long ago, I got to see the interior, and the juxtaposition between old and new is fantastic.
WSJ interview
Branson is interviewed for the Wall Street Journal and says that most of his disruptive efforts are in philanthropy:
On the pure business side, we’re going to try to get people who would never dream of going on a cruise ship to go on Virgin Cruises. That’s something we’re just starting to build.
The technology he is most excited about:
The small satellites we’re developing, which will be quite transformative in the world. Through a big array of these satellites, billions of people who don’t have mobile-phone access will be able to get it very cheaply. It’ll give them Wi-Fi access, which means they’ll be able to get an education and health information. If a plane disappears, we’ll be able to know exactly where it is. If there’s an illegal fishing boat, we’ll be able to pinpoint it.
Guardian interview
Branson talks to The Guardian about the failure of Virgin Cola:
When we took on Coca-Cola, we had a year in which we were really giving Coke and Pepsi a run for their money and we were very much the underdogs taking on the biggest giant in the world, and when they sent in their big tanks and to an extent crushed us, the public didn’t think any the poorer of the Virgin brand for it. In fact, I would say the Virgin brand was enhanced by the battle.
He doesn’t regret the venture:
The key thing is never to do anything which discredits the brand, like ripping off the public or doing something which you’d feel uncomfortable reading about. If you’re going to go down, go down fighting.
Richard Branson interview
Branson and Letterman discuss the upcoming Space trip on The Late Show with David Letterman.
You will know you are in space because when you unbuckle you can just float around.
New York Times interview
Branson is interviewed for the New York Times magazine. On a Virgin employee who stole from him but later went on to discover Boy George:
We hire a lot of ex-convicts, and not one of them has reoffended. They’re just human. I messed up with the tax man when I was a teenager, and I was given a second chance then. If I hadn’t had that second chance, there wouldn’t be 60,000 people working for Virgin today. We wouldn’t be going to space in a few months’ time. Second chances should be allowed. But, I mean, not always.
He is not worried that the $250,000 ticket price for Galactic flights turns space travel into a luxury purchase:
Not at all. If you go back to the 1920s, when aviation started, it cost the equivalent of about $200,000 to cross the Atlantic. Over the years, the price has come down. You’ve got to start somewhere.
Huffington Post interview
Branson is interviewed for Huffington Post. On who is currently the most important person in philanthropy:
The first person that comes to mind is Jochen Zeitz, the former CEO of Puma, who is the co-founder of The B Team (which, like Carbon War Room, was started with Virgin Unite).
Carbon War Room’s contributions to tech innovation:
Well, for example, we are using tech to help get 20 gigatons of carbon out of the atmosphere to balance the Earth’s books. And tech is always innovating — now, the same guy who designed your iPad is now trying to save a lot of energy in homes, making it more affordable.
Jetset Magazine interview
Jetset Magazine publishes an interview with Branson. He discusses treating drugs as a health problem rather than a criminal problem:
I’m part of a global commission on drugs, which is basically 15 ex-presidents and myself who have looked at the war on drugs and seen that it’s been a failure. What we want to see happen is for governments to experiment with different approaches. The current approach has definitely not worked. We don’t want people harmed, we want people helped. We want laws changed.
London Business School interview
Branson is interviewed for the London School of Business and Finance by David Blunkett. On the role of universities:
Universities should be encouraging people to run their businesses within the university, where entrepreneurs, teachers and students can share ideas and help each other. We need to encourage entrepreneurs to stay within the confines of universities and get the support they need.
Interaction with education providers:
Through technology, businesses could be tapping into a lot of students in universities worldwide, making the time we spend exchanging values and ideas far more useful. Entrepreneurs have a different way of doing things and they can look into situations, with the benefit of experience, and help governments and social sectors to tackle things in a better way.
His plans to study as a mature student:
When I was 40 I said to my wife ‘I’m taking two years off to go to university’, and she said ‘It’s a midlife crisis – you’re just after those young ladies at the university.
The European Magazine interview
Branson tells The European Magazine that entrepreneurship is a crisis fix:
With staggering youth unemployment figures today I believe we need to encourage the use of terms like innovation and innovative as entrepreneurship offers some hope and an alternative to the traditional career path.
Fear of disruption holds ideas back:
Most people are too anxious to destroy. The iPod effectively destroyed the selling of records. To the detriment of the music industry but for the benefit of the public.
The new innovation with the best potential:
There’s a wonderful new company in New Zealand called Lanzatech that has invented a way of turning the waste products that go up the chimneys of steel and aluminium plants into aviation fuel. Recycling at its best. Once day all planes could operate on this fuel.
Origin Magazine interview
Branson tells Origin magazine that the same advices applies for men and women in business:
By just getting out there and doing it, you’re going to learn all the pitfalls. It may succeed, it may not succeed, but unless you actually try it, it’s definitely not going to succeed. I think the slogan “Screw it, just do it”–I think the same applies to women and men. Get on and give it a go. Learn from it if it doesn’t work out. Pick yourself up and try again.
Entrepreneurs should lead from the front:
Leading by fear is a lot of companies’ approach, and a horrible way for people to exist in their lives, when most of your life is spent at work. I’m sure you get the best out of people if you look for the best in them.
BBC Radio 6 interview
Branson tells Stuart Maconie on BBC Radio 6 Music that his Virgin stores were the first time music lovers could go to a proper store. An ad for the store:
There are no dopes at Virgin Records, that’s because all our customers are cool. They know a swell joint when they see one.
Branson:
The alternative was to go to a very staid Woolworths or Menzies to buy your music, it was incredibly dull, and this was the first time that people could come into a record shop and it would have pillows on the floor, there were bootlegs on the wall. There were people that actually knew about music, who went there to talk about music, and if you did smoke a joint sitting on the pillows you weren’t going to be told to leave the store. It was a proper music shop.
That attracted a crowd:
There was a shop in Liverpool which we opened… and the first week the takings were £20,000 and the next week it was £19k, next week £18k and it got down to about £500 and I decided I’d better go up to Liverpool to find out what was happening, and it had become a club. There was no way anybody could get to the till to buy any music. It was just a place that every single person in Liverpool went to hang out, and it was a free club of course. So that went a little bit too far
LinkedIn interview
Branson is interviewed for LinkedIn. On women in leadership:
In the end, it’s down to individuals. I would encourage companies to work really hard towards getting a 50/50 split of women on their board — even to the extent of encouraging politicians to actually change laws to force a situation to where there’s 50% women on boards. Because in countries where they’ve done it — like Norway and Sweden — the companies seem to have benefited from it. But in the meantime, all of us who own companies must try to increase the size of our boards to make sure we get more women on the boards.
Inc. interview
Branson tells Leigh Buchanan and Andrew McLean for Inc. that it’s possible to succeed in a first venture:
Everyone who creates something is doing something audacious because the most difficult time is when you’re starting from scratch with no financial backing, just an idea, and you’re trying to get your very first venture off the ground … true audaciousness comes from those people who just have the pluck and the courage to say screw it, let’s do it, I see a gap in the market, I may fall flat on my face and it may cost me everything
Forbes interview
Branson tells Forbes that many presentations are ineffective:
Too many people are hiding in dark rooms flipping through too many words on big screens. There’s a reason why I avoid boardrooms. I’d rather spend time with people ‘in the field,’ where eye contact, genuine conviction and trustworthiness are in full evidence.
Ideas should be concise:
From the beginning, Virgin used clear, ordinary language. If I could quickly understand a campaign concept, it was good to go. If something can’t be explained off the back of an envelope, it’s rubbish.
NPR interview
Branson is interviewed for NPR. Virgin doesn’t normally do M&A:
Having said that, it would be quite fun to do something with American Airlines. And so, yeah, if anybody from American Airlines is listening, we’d be happy to get your call.
American should raise quality in areas like cabin furnishings and hostess uniforms:
I mean, when we started 30 years ago with one plane flying out of England, there were 15 American carriers that we were competing with: Pan Am, TWA, Eastern, People Express, etc., etc. Every single one of them … disappeared. And they disappeared because, although we were much smaller than them, their quality was awful.
Sustainable fuels can work in the airline industry:
When we did the first test flight on coconut oil, using coconuts and a mixture, you know, there [were] a lot of jokes made. The chairman of British Airways said it was all pie in the sky, etc., etc. But the most important thing in life is just to try these things, and we tried it.
AskMen interview
Branson tells AskMen that his hero is Tutu:
He’s taught us to forgive our enemies, which is important. He also has a wonderful sense of humor.
Entrepreneur interview
Branson tells Entrepreneur that Virgin Galactic is a new experience after previous ventures focused on industries that were already established:
First we’re taking people to suborbital space travel, then orbital, and then we’ll be able to put satellites into space at a fraction of the price it currently costs. One day, maybe even hotels in space–who’s to know? Whatever happens, it’s going to be ridiculously exciting. It’s the start of a whole new era.
Like other Virgin ventures, Galactic grew out of consumer frustration:
I thought when I saw the moon landing all those years ago that one day NASA would be able to fly me into space … soon it became apparent that government-run companies don’t have any interest in worrying about you or me going to space. They have other things on their minds.
He is spending more time focusing on causes like those promoted through The Elders group led by Archbishop Desmond Tutu:
A lot of my entrepreneurial skills now are spent in setting up not-for-profit organizations. We’re a little more secure now, so we do things a bit differently … I enjoy life too much to become complacent. I was on the phone this morning with the president of the Maldives–there’s been a coup there, and I’m trying to see if I can help him not get arrested. I’m in a position where I can make a difference and think I shouldn’t waste that. Life is far too much fun and interesting not to throw myself wholeheartedly into it, and I suspect I’ll keep doing so until I drop.
Globe & Mail interview
Branson tells the Globe and Mail that he wants brothels to be legalized, licensed and taxed, and an end to the practice of slicing the fins off sharks for shark soup and discarding the fish to die. He hopes marijuana sales will be legalized and taxed to fund social programs such as treatment centres for hard-drug users, and sees Portugal’s drug laws as an example:
In the last 10 years, they have not sent one person to prison for taking drugs and HIV infections have dropped by 50 per cent. They give out clean needles, they build treatment centres, marijuana use among young people has declined and society has saved a lot of money
Joe Polish interview
ILoveMarketing.com podcast creator Joe Polish interviews Branson:
I’m not sure that somebody would know they’re an entrepreneur from the beginning, they’ll have a desire a difference to other people’s lives and they’ll see that something’s frustrating them, there’s a gap in the market and they’ll believe they can do it better themselves, and they’ll fill that gap in the market.
Time interview
Branson answers questions from Time readers, including one on running an airline while promoting environmental causes:
I think it’s because I own an airline and I’m running a dirty business that I decided to do something about it. I could either sell the airline to somebody else and those planes would keep on flying, and emitting, damaging the environment, or I could pledge 100% of the profit of the airlines, which I have done, and which will amount to about $3 billion over the next few years, into developing new, clean fuels.
