Richard Branson Quotes

240 Richard Branson Quotes

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No matter how late I got home, the telephone rang. Every time we woke up on a Saturday morning it rang again.
Richard Branson

I had been guilty of wanting to have my cake and eat it: having a great relationship without making a commitment to it.
Richard Branson

I pledged to myself that I’d never miss the birth of one of our children.
Richard Branson

Whenever Virgin has money I always renew my search for new opportunities. I am continually trying to broaden the Group so we are not dependent on a narrow source of income, but I suspect this is more down to inquisitiveness and restlessness than sound financial sense.
Richard Branson

[On his fledgling magazine ‘Event’] I decided to cut our losses and close down the magazine.
Richard Branson

The one positive thing about the ‘Event’ episode was that I realised how important it was to separate the various Virgin companies so that, if one failed, it would not threaten the rest of the Virgin Group.
Richard Branson

[On ‘Event’] Rather than defaulting on our debts, we paid them up and shut down the magazine.
Richard Branson

[On Boy George] It was impossible to define why he was so popular: parents wanted to mother him; girls wanted to be as beautiful; boys wanted their girlfriends to be as beautiful; it’s impossible to quantify.
Richard Branson

From the 900,000 pounds loss in 1980, we made a profit of 2 million pounds in 1982 on sales of 50 million pounds.
Richard Branson

The extraordinary thing about the record industry is how success can take off without warning.
Richard Branson



I have always thrived on havoc and adrenaline…
Richard Branson

It is always easier to live with the benefit of hindsight.
Richard Branson

Nik was happy to leave a company that looked as if it was heading into trouble, and I was happy to have virtually full control of my destiny, even if I knew that Virgin was on a knife edge.
Richard Branson

I… wanted to expand the Virgin name to stand for more than a record label, and become more involved in all kinds of media.
Richard Branson

It is a British characteristic not to discuss money over a meal, but when this boils over into never discussing business then I think it represents a lost opportunity. It is small wonder that there are so few business entrepreneurs when business is excluded from the family circle.
Richard Branson

When you employ exactly those people you want… [you] really establish the kind of atmosphere you want.
Richard Branson

I rely far more on gut instinct than researching huge amounts of statistics.
Richard Branson

I distrust numbers, which I feel can be twisted to prove anything.
Richard Branson

[On ringing in 1984 People Express who was at the time the only airline offering cheap airfares across the Atlantic] It was that continual engaged tone on my telephone throughout Saturday more than anything else which triggered my belief that we could set up and run an airline.
Richard Branson

The beauty of starting up from scratch rather than buying an existing airline was that we could easily retreat if it didn’t work.
Richard Branson



After two months of negotiation I think Boeing were rather surprised at our tenacity: ‘It’s easier to sell a fleet of jumbos to an American airline than just one to Virgin,’ admitted their negotiator after we had finished.
Richard Branson

One of the engines blew up and we can’t get our insurance until we get our licence. Without a new engine, we won’t be able to get our licence. It’s a catch-22 situation.
Richard Branson

We’ve go to get as much money in from overseas as possible today. And then we’ve got to find new bankers.
Richard Branson

I want to push myself to my limits.
Richard Branson

I would say that I love to experience as much as I can of life. I never think that I am going to die by accident, but if I were to die then all I can say is that I was wrong…but at least I tried.
Richard Branson

[On confusing Esso with BP] I looked up at the wall opposite me and noticed the huge Esso logo. I realised my mistake. The Esso executives looked at me with horror, as if I were a ghost. I fell down on the floor and crawled under the table. ‘I am sorry,’ I said, and started to spit and polish their shoes.
Richard Branson

I will never forget going into the City to see the lines of people queuing up to buy Virgin shares.
Richard Branson

Unlike really losing your virginity, in whatever world you make for yourself, you can keep embracing the new and the different over and over again.
Richard Branson

I know that other businessmen such as Rupert Murdoch and Robert Maxwell had their children reading annual reports and financial accounts before breakfast, but I want none of that.
Richard Branson

What I’d always thought was that Virgin should be more than just a money-making machine…
Richard Branson



All the things that have happened to me, to the family and to Virgin have taught me that you have to be prepared at all times to deal with surprises. You just develop a way of picking up your feet and getting on with it.
Richard Branson

Whatever problems we had, it was so very much worse for them.
Richard Branson

My vision for Virgin was ultimately summed up by Peter Gabriel, who once said to me, ‘It’s outrageous!’
Richard Branson

Joan and I were finally getting married and I didn’t want the Milk Tray to melt. I prepared to jump.
Richard Branson

Two of the main ingredients of an airline’s profitability are the number of passengers and the cost of aviation fuel.
Richard Branson

I have never enjoyed being accountable to anyone else or not being in control of my own destiny.
Richard Branson

I had the ability to persuade them to say yes, and the obstinacy never to accept no for an answer.
Richard Branson

If you want milk, don’t sit on a stool in the middle of a field in the hope that the cow will back up to you.
Richard Branson

An old recipe for rabbit pie said, ‘First, catch the rabbit.’ Note that it didn’t say, ‘First, buy the rabbit, or sit on your bottom until someone gives it to you.’
Richard Branson

Go ahead, take that first step – just do it.
Richard Branson



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