Transcription
Back in the 1960s, the reason America grew well in the 1960s is the majority of shares were owned by private individuals who just thought IBM looks a reasonably good company. Albert, they didn't have to present to their family every [ __ ] quarter as to why they were keeping the shares, right?
And so family-owned companies innovate. Four out of the five gold winners at the IPA advertising effectiveness awards. I'll list them. McCain, family-owned Canadian company. Laithweights, British family-owned wine company. Specs Savers, family-owned, franchise, but chain of opticians, family-owned. Uh, the fourth one was Yorkshire Tea, family-owned. Fifth one was Guinness. Four of them are family-owned businesses. Wow.
You go to Texas and you keep coming across these places. There's a place called HB, retail chain, so good that Walmart didn't bother to compete with them. Family-owned. Bies, extraordinarily eccentric chain of monster gas stations, which have turned gas stations into a destination. The psychology behind it is absolutely ingenious. Their entire business model was basically based on the human bladder. The logic is why do people stop at a gas station? Well, actually, it's not really to get gas. It's cuz someone needs it. Yeah. The only way we can actually get more customers than any other gas station rather than just is to make people hold on longer because they're willing to hold on for an extra few miles to go to a better gas station. The posters will say, "By's 126 mi. You can hold on."