brand-new batch of goods.
Once again, he had stepped up to the challenge and passed with flying colours. Within a matter of months, Marks was so impressed that he allowed Sugar more leeway, giving him four weeks to pay for each consignment. Even under this looser way of working, Sugar never let him down. Indeed, he was to regard Marks as a confidant. Like many who are successful early in their life, Sugar gained a lot of respect – but he also found he had to put up with a certain amount of condescension and patronising from some old-school business types. ‘I can’t stand doing business with him because he treats me like a little schoolboy,’ Sugar confided in Marks, as they discussed a third party. ‘He always calls me “son”. I’d rather talk to his storeman.’
However, all the patronising people in the world couldn’t hold Sugar back. His success and reputation soon snowballed. As he approached new wholesalers, he could refer any sceptical questions to those he was already working with, all of whom would give him a glowing recommendation.
Soon, though, Alan Sugar wanted to turn from a salesman into a manufacturer. The first major breakthrough that Amstrad had to this effect came in the hi-fi market. Sugar noted, back in the 1970s, that the dustcovers for turntables were very expensive. ‘So I decided to find out how they were made,’ he said. ‘I’m a quick learner, when I want to be. I found out aboutinjection moulding, how it was done, and got someone to make me a few thousand. Until then, I’d been buying stuff at £ 1 each, and hustling to sell it at £ 1.10. With the plastic tops, I became a producer, making something at four shillings [20p], which I sold for a quid. I’d risen above being just a buyer and seller.’ He had invested £ 1,805 in the injection-moulding machine and he was quickly reaping the rewards.
However, the electrical stores that stocked turntables were also beginning to stock an entirely new kind of product – one that was to make Sugar an absolute fortune.
CHAPTER FOUR
COMPUTERS
A s he sat in the Amstrad headquarters, computer engineer Mark Eric-Jones wondered who this charismatic late arrival to the meeting was. It seemed he had just stepped off a plane at Heathrow Airport and strolled into the meeting as if he owned the place. It was a lively meeting, but Eric-Jones noticed that, whenever this man spoke, everybody else would immediately fall silent and listen intently. Who was he? Mark Eric-Jones, meet Alan Sugar.
As the others at the meeting fell silent, Sugar announced that he wanted Amstrad to enter the home-computer trade. This was no vague dream of a rich man: he had a distinct vision as to how his company would pitch themselves in this growing market. Not only that, Sugar wanted to enter the market very quickly – within months. Warming to his theme, he eloquently outlinedhow he envisaged all this working. He wanted to launch a computer that was ‘a real computer, not a pregnant calculator’. When it came to computers, for Sugar, size was everything. In the 21st century, computer manufacturers struggle to produce ever sleeker, thinner and more diminutive laptops. But, back in the 1980s, Sugar felt that bigger was definitely better.
He had first become interested in the computer market in 1982. Companies such as Commodore, Spectrum, Acorn and Oric were making a tidy profit selling home computers to a public who were fascinated by this new trend. At up to £ 300 a go, these computers were proving a very nice little earner. He wanted the model to have ‘perceived value for money’, and to gain that he wished to ape the sort of computers that the public normally saw only in airports and offices. Furthermore, this would be an all-in-one model. Those who purchased home computers back then normally had to buy a cassette recorder to plug into the computer, which was then itself plugged into the family television set. It was a complicated, cumbersome and rather
Once again, he had stepped up to the challenge and passed with flying colours. Within a matter of months, Marks was so impressed that he allowed Sugar more leeway, giving him four weeks to pay for each consignment. Even under this looser way of working, Sugar never let him down. Indeed, he was to regard Marks as a confidant. Like many who are successful early in their life, Sugar gained a lot of respect – but he also found he had to put up with a certain amount of condescension and patronising from some old-school business types. ‘I can’t stand doing business with him because he treats me like a little schoolboy,’ Sugar confided in Marks, as they discussed a third party. ‘He always calls me “son”. I’d rather talk to his storeman.’
However, all the patronising people in the world couldn’t hold Sugar back. His success and reputation soon snowballed. As he approached new wholesalers, he could refer any sceptical questions to those he was already working with, all of whom would give him a glowing recommendation.
Soon, though, Alan Sugar wanted to turn from a salesman into a manufacturer. The first major breakthrough that Amstrad had to this effect came in the hi-fi market. Sugar noted, back in the 1970s, that the dustcovers for turntables were very expensive. ‘So I decided to find out how they were made,’ he said. ‘I’m a quick learner, when I want to be. I found out aboutinjection moulding, how it was done, and got someone to make me a few thousand. Until then, I’d been buying stuff at £ 1 each, and hustling to sell it at £ 1.10. With the plastic tops, I became a producer, making something at four shillings [20p], which I sold for a quid. I’d risen above being just a buyer and seller.’ He had invested £ 1,805 in the injection-moulding machine and he was quickly reaping the rewards.
However, the electrical stores that stocked turntables were also beginning to stock an entirely new kind of product – one that was to make Sugar an absolute fortune.
CHAPTER FOUR
COMPUTERS
A s he sat in the Amstrad headquarters, computer engineer Mark Eric-Jones wondered who this charismatic late arrival to the meeting was. It seemed he had just stepped off a plane at Heathrow Airport and strolled into the meeting as if he owned the place. It was a lively meeting, but Eric-Jones noticed that, whenever this man spoke, everybody else would immediately fall silent and listen intently. Who was he? Mark Eric-Jones, meet Alan Sugar.
As the others at the meeting fell silent, Sugar announced that he wanted Amstrad to enter the home-computer trade. This was no vague dream of a rich man: he had a distinct vision as to how his company would pitch themselves in this growing market. Not only that, Sugar wanted to enter the market very quickly – within months. Warming to his theme, he eloquently outlinedhow he envisaged all this working. He wanted to launch a computer that was ‘a real computer, not a pregnant calculator’. When it came to computers, for Sugar, size was everything. In the 21st century, computer manufacturers struggle to produce ever sleeker, thinner and more diminutive laptops. But, back in the 1980s, Sugar felt that bigger was definitely better.
He had first become interested in the computer market in 1982. Companies such as Commodore, Spectrum, Acorn and Oric were making a tidy profit selling home computers to a public who were fascinated by this new trend. At up to £ 300 a go, these computers were proving a very nice little earner. He wanted the model to have ‘perceived value for money’, and to gain that he wished to ape the sort of computers that the public normally saw only in airports and offices. Furthermore, this would be an all-in-one model. Those who purchased home computers back then normally had to buy a cassette recorder to plug into the computer, which was then itself plugged into the family television set. It was a complicated, cumbersome and rather
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