How we built a business out of recession - chapter 41 - Low octaine
The story of CitNOW*
This is the 41st chapter about CitNOW, the company started from a kitchen table in Winnersh, Berkshire. If you’d like to read from the beginning, here’s a link to chpt 1. Each chapter is a 5-minute read. It’s an early draft of a book.
CitNOW was founded by Andrew Howells and Donna Barradale in 2005, although the company was only registered in 2008. In February 2018, we sold the company to Tenzing, a UK private equity company. It has been sold again since.
Over the past 40 chapters, I haven’t been very complimentary about the consultants that we employed from time to time. Most delivered little to no value, but there were several exceptions. Chris, our long-standing and suffering ex-senior manager from General Motors, built the foundations of the European senior team with introductions to four of the five country managers we employed. The other, who certainly went under nearly everyone’s radar, was Ken. He’d been Head of Marketing and Comms at Hyundai, RAC and Inchcape and was a friend of Donna’s. He became a very useful ally and confidante when our sail boat** started to sink.
We introduced the idea of seeking his assistance at a board meeting which was immediately poo pooed by Alistair. We already had two non execs attending our board meetings, Chris and Geoffrey, so he wasn’t seeking more external help. It, of course, made us even more determined because they weren’t in a position to suggest the sort of radical action which we believed was now required. And certainly not at a board meeting, where some heads around the table might need to consider their position. The board needed leadership, and some trite statement about selling ourselves out of the current predicament wouldn’t cut it.
Objectivity and planning were precisely what we were after, and I started meeting Ken at our offices every 4 to 6 weeks.
I’d already met him 10 years before when Donna and I tried to persuade him to become an interactive TV advertiser when he was at RAC, joining some of the other companies who we were working with, including P&G, Unilever and Honda.
It was an unforgettable meeting, but not for the reasons you might have expected. Ken offered tea and coffee before patiently sitting through our presentation. It was only at the end, when the meeting was wrapping up, that he teased Donna about her new perfume and its remarkable authenticity to diesel, but not the one found in the department store.
Unfortunately, Donna had visited the petrol station before the meeting and managed to get more than a smattering of diesel on her clothes when the Land Rover spat back - an airlock problem shared with various manufacturers, now resolved. Despite her best efforts to dampen the impact in the RAC’s toilets, she hadn’t got away with it. We had to laugh, especially as Ken had sat through to the end, saying nothing, presumably conscious of the fire hazard sitting across the table.
When Donna made the introduction again, Ken was happy to meet. He had already gone part-time and was starting to be asked about potential non-executive roles, which he wasn’t rushing into. He met us in Wokingham wearing his black leathers, having decided to commute from his Surrey home on his BMW motorcycle.
I must admit to a pang of jealousy, Ken seemed so buttoned down. He’d had a successful career, mostly in automotive and was now beginning to enjoy himself, having the freedom to buy a big-engined BMW bike and go on rides with his son. His current job was winding down. He could enjoy spending more time with his family and do it all without worrying too much about the budget.
We, on the other hand, were looking down the barrel at a problem that could easily have finished the business off despite the years of hard work and sacrifices already made. Our efforts could all add up to very little, giving me recurring nightmares of a return to selling again, working hard for someone else well into my seventies to pay the bills.
We’d decided that the best way forward was for me to spend time with Ken alone. We didn’t want to be accused of indulging our whims, and it really didn’t need the two of us. Plus, we were busy, busier than ever, despite the more significant financial issues we were now starting to address.
I spent that first meeting outlining everything I could think of. We agreed that I would give Ken last month’s board pack, which included our quarterly accounts, so he could get a better understanding of what was happening before we reconvened.
I also talked about remuneration. He was the first consultant who told me not to worry about that, at least not for now. We could sort something out once he’d had a chance to review and reflect, having got a better understanding of our problems.
It was clear to us that we were in trouble. We knew that we needed to make changes before it was too late. I expected Ken to come to the same conclusion, which was part of the reason for asking in the first place. I just wanted to hear someone else tell me what we already knew.
He wasted no time either at our next meeting. His analogy was different from my sailboat, but the outcome was exactly the same. We were on an oil platform with an out-of-control fire. It was a serious emergency. The fire had to be contained and extinguished as a priority, which can be translated as getting a handle on your costs - now, before it’s too late and the whole rig goes up.
The confirmation was unequivocal. We were in deep shit and needed a sensible, well orchestrated plan to get back on track. It needed to be done stealthily so our customers remained unaware. If the press did find out, which was likely, we would have an entirely plausible story as to why we were cutting costs, plus some half-decent good news which deflected and diluted from their reason for a call in the first place.
The biggest issue was getting anything accepted by the board and Alistair once a plan was in place.
Part of the solution was down to Angela becoming a shareholder. It was time to stop addressing the board and time to start addressing the shareholders.
*CitNOW was our company’s trade name before we sold it in 2018.
**A sailing boat was a metaphor for a company, which you can read about in Chapter 40.