Compilation: These UNTOLD Stories Will Blow Your Mind

0:00Who is the most difficult person you've ever interviewed? Vladimir Putin. Wow. That's pretty cool that you interviewed him. I did in 2019 in the Kremlin. Wow. He kept me waiting for four hours. I think that's fair enough. It is. He is psychologically, he's really intimidating. And he only speaks in Russian, right? Yes, but I decided to try and, you know, get on the right side of the interview by being polite, but speaking to him in German. because he was a KGB agent in East Germany. And he spoke back in German. His German is flawless. And that was a way of connecting. But if you interview him with those watery eyes that he has and he looks right through you, it's fairly intimidating.

0:53Blimey. What was the most exciting insight that you got out of him? Did you feel like you got anything out of him that you wanted to? Like your job is to get things out and his job is to withhold, right? You bet I got something because I did, again, it's worth thinking about how do you do an interview with someone like that? Well, the answer is you do prep. You don't read lots and lots of books, but you talk to people who know Putin. So I rang up Bill Burns, who's now the director of the CIA, and he'd been ambassador in, I like to drop names. This is a quality podcast. Yeah, yeah, quality people.

1:29Quality people. So I rang him up and he was, he had been ambassador in Moscow. He'd also been deputy secretary of state. So he'd met Putin for hours. And I just said, just tell me, you know, what, what shouldn't I do? And he said, don't talk down to him. Be very respectful at the beginning. And then I said, thank you, Bill. It's been absolutely great. I've known him for a number of years. And I said, tell me the question you would ask him. and he came up with this great question which was Mr. President you've been in power for 20 years would you say that your risk appetite has gone up or down after 20 years so this was translated it was consecutive translation and Putin looked at me and he kind of gave a I'm not going to answer that you know it's difficult to say and then i looked at him kind of and he said we have a russian saying those who do not take the risk do not get to drink the champagne that just captured putin because if you think of what happened 18 months later yeah with ukraine he's drinking champagne he was up for the risk taking yeah so it's that kind of that was that was a bit of a moment what did you think of tucker colson's interview with putin terrible did you because he basically was just a sycophant he was a total sycophant now again i don't want to be smart ass because i've made lots of mistakes but this interview that i did with putin was probably one of the highlights of my career and i did bring my colleague henry foy who's now the brussels bureau chief he was the west moscow correspondent and he was useful he was with me i did the questioning um but i said i looked at tucker carlson and he he was sycophantic at the beginning and putin uh when he asked his first question putin said i thought this was going to be a serious interview yeah i know this is just like a talk show host absolutely see he masterminded him so hard he did but when i saw putin i just said thank you very much in german and he looked at me and he said because i said i'd met him before and he said where did you learn your german and i said well actually at oxford university but i also was a student in germany but i studied german and modern history at oxford and putin looked at me and immediately said in german what is modern history at this point i'm like a prize fighter that's just been hit on the nose the chin i'm gasping for air what do i say and i i kind of got it together and i said mr president modern history is everything after 1989 he loved that and then he said okay now sit down so yeah that versus tiger carlson yeah it's a i mean look again i've made lots of mistakes but But that was to just establish that I had a bit of a brain.

4:42I mean, Carlson was useless. Terrible interview. When did you first experience getting a lot of money yourself? Because obviously you've built a very big company, but we all know that typically when building a big company, you don't actually make much money from it very early on and often don't for a very long time. So when did it first financially change your own life? I don't think I've told this story before, but it was simultaneously the best and the worst day of my life. So I never had any money of any significance or any note until 2017 when we did a deal with a big US private equity company.

5:18And as part of that deal, I got 50 million for a small amount of my shares in the company. Amazing, life-changing, fantastic. The money was transferred. 50 million? Yeah. Yeah, that'll do it. The money was transferred into our lawyer's bank account. TSG were in Scotland that evening. We had some beers to celebrate. we had an event the next day fine money was in our lawyers bank account come monday my amazing assistant at the time contacted lawyers okay from the client account here's i set up a new bank account especially here's the deals for james new bank account here's where the money should go confirmed it bang next day no money i'm like oh next day no money bethany phone the lawyers what's happened she phones them up they've transferred it james it should just be a rebanking delay next day no money we get to the friday the money's still not in my bank account i'm like what the hell like what's happened here spend a weekend panicking the cold sweat get to the monday we phone the lawyers again and we get the bank details that they put in and my assistant god bless her who's lovely and amazing she was one digit out with the bank oh my god she gave the lawyers so we're this two days in like limbo we're speaking at the bank and the bank's like god we verbally confirmed those details 50 million 50 million 50 million 50 million and i'm thinking oh my god i've got to do this 10 years of work all over again what am i going to do i'm like back to square i'm back it's like hard to describe the feeling of like never had any kind of money of note getting 50 million and the money being sent to wrong bank account and the money being lost so it's lost it's lost we contact the bank and the bank's like you gave us like your verbally it's like there's nothing we can there's nothing we can do here but like we're trying to help you but there's just to manage expectations there's no guarantee we don't know where it is we're going to look into it we're going to get one of our teams to look into it but the money could be anywhere now and unfortunately if it's landed in a bank account they could have hopped it just to manage expectations the money could be gone and I remember cycling home that night and thinking it's like 10 years of work one false digit like gone so it gets to Can you imagine how horrendous your EA was I would tell you about something when you finish the story which you're going to be like fucking hell So we get to the Thursday and the bank's okay we've managed to track it down we're in contact with the bank i'm like thank thank goodness and then by the friday they'd managed to get a bank for the other managed to get back for the other bank that was somewhere in eastern europe and so the bank held it and by the monday so 15 days later it ended up in and it ended up in my bank account but like it's so many points during that 15 days i'm just gonna have to do it again fine i'll do it again the uh the funny thing is you know earlier i was i have to call my lawyer my i'm getting sent my payment well we're on basically today for selling a company and so i should be getting it now that you've talked

8:03those numbers i know check those numbers like did i put it in the right place um so yeah after the episode i'll let you know i couldn't stick for two weeks that's crazy that is horrendous though yeah so what's the answer to the question what was the question again well oh yeah so i mean he You got 50 million when they sold to private equity. Yeah, totally. How many years in were you? That was 10 years in. That was in 2017. Up until then, had you been paid a lot? Oh, no. So for the first six years of the business, we didn't pay ourselves at all. For this kind of few years after that, we paid ourselves£450 a month.

8:39And for the first few years of the business, I was still working part-time as a North Atlantic captain because I couldn't afford to pay myself. So I needed some form of income from somewhere. So I think before we did that private equity deal, I was paying myself maybe 60 or 70 ,000 a year. And what does life look like now? I mean, we're a long way on from that moment as well now, right? Yeah. When was that? 2017. That's 2017. So we're seven years on. Wow. Okay. And so what does life with money look like now, different for you? I guess like as a person, like friends, exactly the same. Like all my best friends are people that I used to work with in the fishing boat.

9:11I absolutely love them. A house that I live up in Scotland is kind of pretty much the same type of house and setup it is. I've got a really nice apartment in London which which you've been to so I spent a bit of money in and that and it just means I'm able to like do things and go places I want to means I'm able to invest in things I'm passionate about like my own health the health and wellness of my family and means I'm able to kind of invest in other businesses and try and help them in their journey as well so it's it's it's been massively positive and I'm very grateful to have built a business and been able to take some money off the off the table but I think there's a kind of old saying that kind of money just makes you more of the same of what you were before so if you're an asshole before you're even more of one if you're a kind person before you're even more of one so i don't think it's changed that much and i think that philosophy i had in those kind of two weeks when i thought the money was lost it's like we'll just do it again i think there's like a skill set there's like an ambition so i'm never kind of too bound to money and maybe it's a bit too much faith in my own ability or something but i i kind of would back myself to start something again and build something again and be able to monetize that again which means okay there's money but hey we can make more money if we need to i've watched you on dragons then for quite a while now i am a super fan of the show uh for as long as i can honestly remember but i think i picked up on the show when you were already a dragon so i would love to hear a little bit about how you got your start in business because i think for everyone it'll be a fascinating story so i always knew i mean even when i was sort of four and five years old i wanted to be in business i'm it's weird I never ever played jobs.

10:41I was always I always had a job or a car wash. Always the CEO. Always the CEO. So I always knew it was absolutely and I think it's it's a fierce. It's the independence. I want to make my own decisions whether they're right. And I can take, you know, get the benefit of that, or whether they're wrong. And I take responsibility for that. So I think I always knew I was going to do it. um so when i first you know i i went to business i say i went to business college i popped in every now and then i had a fantastic time in brighton that's probably not a good lesson to people um fantastic time anyway um uh did this and then and then i thought now what am i going to do was completely stuck you know just kind of my life wasn't moving as i want to want a business i don't know what that is so i changed something and i think that's something in life change the scenery if you change the scenery something new happens so i had an ex-boyfriend who who moved over to italy and i thought i'd go i'd follow him whether he liked it or not yeah um and he was a fashion designer i went over there and i spent it and then i ran out of money and i thought right now really i'm gonna have to concentrate i really do need to do something here so i managed to convince four italian businesses with beautiful i was 19 at the time um with beautiful homeware products that i could be uh their agent and bring them back into the uk so that was kind of my that was my first business wow so and you know all credit to them they didn't know me from adam you know they they kind of i think they're mildly startled like who does she think she is and was it a success what no no uh so it was uh so we had a um i got into top drawer which i think is still going so it's sort of the high-end gifts exhibition um and got into harrods and harvey nichols and um benix amazing um and then the next year all dried up and they started to bypass me and sell direct into the into the stores and i could have you know i could have fought them for the rest of my you know yes the rest of my years but that was a very early lesson i think life's too short i don't have the time i don't have the cash then let's just learn and move on but amazing learning experience i would often say to young entrepreneurs like i don't mind if you had a few years doing something that didn't pan out i love hearing that story the things that you would learn like how to manage how to market customers so true being a middle person you know like i do it all again i make the same mistakes again because they all go it all goes into your toolbox doesn't it all that stuff you learn you think oh i didn't like that what did you use those lessons for what do you do next um so the next thing and that again that came out of italy so i'd seen stefanel um fashion business in italy and was was literally walking down knightsbridge high street and saw a stefanel i thought oh i wonder if they're coming into the uk and i wonder if they're franchising so I must have been 20 maybe 21 went in as it happened their um head office was downstairs and I said oh is the um is whoever's in charge of franchising you can franchise and they went oh yeah whoever's can I meet them yeah he's here and I met him amazing guy he let me have a um he he said yeah no we're doing franchising yeah and so I had a friend down in Taunton with a shop that was doing next to nothing and I said to him how about we do a Stefan L franchise together and we did one of the first stefanel franchises in the uk and again all credit to carlo magello carlo magello there we go he used to be head of fiorucci and then he moved into stefanel so he was the ceo and he happened to be and i was you know it was just luck i just walked into the shop he was there and he said yeah no we can talk it's amazing because that's a very much a the wayne gretzky thing of you miss 100 of the shots you don't take that's just like you just It's like, well, I'm going to just walk in there right now.

14:27I'm going to talk to that person. They're there or not. Give it a go. But a lot of people in those situations, definitely myself included, have been like, no, he's probably not there. Just walk on. And those are important moments. They're important moments. But I also think it's the, I didn't know what you weren't supposed to do. Do you know what I mean? I think we kind of filter out and think, well, that's not normal behaviour. You know, you wouldn't do that. But I think some of the best moments that have happened to me have been the ones where I've just thought, well, I'll just go for it. Just give it a go.

14:55it's in the early part of your career the naivety to not know you know like i i similar to you my first business was a an agency business i used to just walk into big offices trick my way in and go in and say hello and and you win some of your biggest clients and so i think a lot of the time when i look back would i have started the business i'm running it's like it's hard work and to get here has taken so much personal you know toil and trouble but the naivety i think is almost the brilliance. So I say to people, just start even if you don't know the answer because you'll find out. You know, you're working out.

15:30Totally agree. So where does that, where does this franchise gumption energy, where does that lead you? You mean what happened next? Yes, that's a better way of asking it. So then I didn't suit the franchise model. It had way too many rules. And I felt like I was making a lot of money for the franchisee. And credit to them, they, you know, Carlo put a lot of faith into me, but it wasn't working for me. So I sold out to my partner and then I set up a prize bingo in Butlins in Minehead. I love your faces. I've been there. I've been to that Butlins. Yeah, I have, yeah, randomly. I've just watched you on telly for so long and it's so fun to like have the story.

16:17I love it. I am a jolly good bingo caller, if ever you need one. Got something to fall back on? yeah if the den doesn't work bingo and butlins was not what i was expecting no well well to be honest bingo was a fantastic lesson because you are directly it was the prize bingo in butlins on as you you've been there as you walk through to the amusement arcade the amusements so that was mine uh really successful one of the busiest in the country um and made really really good money but boy do you learn some lessons your customer is sat there and they are quite prepared to tell you if they're happy with you or not happy with you time is money literally because the faster you can turn the games over if you've got 50 players you know all paying pound each you know 50 pound a minute you can do a game but if you're not quiet you've got to slow right down so that it so that people see it and you build up a little bit of so it absolutely i cannot tell you the business lessons i learned from that bingo it was brilliant do you think people should be doing not esoteric but you know different kinds of businesses like that just so that they in their early 20s for example so they can learn different skills that will become so valuable later i think people should find their own way you know i think everyone should do bingo i don't think well yes i do actually come to think of it because it's a brilliant way no i think people need to find their own way but i'm not i've never been scared of business and i think it's why i suit dragon's den very well because it's not what the business is doing within my ethical and values bounds it's more about can I understand this business do I understand why it would succeed and what can I add to it you know but it's not like oh no I wouldn't touch manufacturing or I wouldn't you know because I've never walked into anything that I've struggled with over a period of time obviously when you first get involved you need to learn some of the fundamentals but you know generally I've just been well why not so we go from bingo in the Butlins oh gosh then there was a gosh when I lay it out in front of me I'm already glad I asked the question because this is even funnier to her than Bingo so it's going to be good I'm excited to be honest I can't remember most of it but I had a stationary shop called Choice that was a bit like do you remember when Paper Chase first came out so you know it was when I was sort of all the really cool trendy stationary shops I had a stationary shop in Taunton and then I went into the family business which was amusement arcades in Butlins and their holiday park operations and I literally started no there I went in as operations director my parents were who had already had successful businesses got to the age where they were saying look you know we're either going to bring in professional managers or is it something you're interested in doing so it's kind of make up make my mind up time and i think as a as a younger person i'm glad i didn't go straight into that business because they stole me as a little girl never tied it up a room yeah um and used to bring back 50 pound ponies that type of thing um and um and then i decided actually i am interested in this business so i went back and went into the amusement arcade business recommended we sold out of that and um which we did and then moved into the holiday park business amazing and that's where i might have missed some stuff along the way but at the moment holiday park business is where you had first the real big financial success yeah yeah right well the holiday park business was was where i got myself hocked up to the eyeballs making and doing a management buyout with my parents and that's the moment i woke up one morning thinking oh my god