Quotes & Sayings About Great Businesses

Local businesses have never had a great way to get customers in the door. — Andrew Mason

For sure, without question, the writing is better on TV pound for pound than movies because the businesses have changed so much. So all the great writers would rather work for TV, and they do. — Rob Lowe

When I explain our company values and the foundation to prospective employees, they realize that they have an opportunity to do much more than change the way businesses manage and share information. When you take a workforce of smart, creative, dedicated people and say "take this company time to serve your community, and bring along your coworkers, customers, and partners" great things happen. — Marc Benioff

The Great Society went wrong for three major reasons. First, the self-organization the Johnson administration promoted turned out to be not the pooling of family and community resources into shops and businesses, but political pressure for government handouts. Second, the Great Society failed to anticipate the perverse side-effects of handing money out to people who have done nothing to earn it. Third, while the Great Society was showering money on the poor, the Supreme Court was with childlike glee smashing to bits traditional methods of maintaining law and order. — David Frum

Most of the great businesses of our time have experimented. Like Google. — Evan Williams

Don't invest in pieces of papers (stocks), invest in great businesses underlying them — Warren Buffett

Between the Great Depression and the 1970s, private business was viewed with suspicion even in most capitalist economies.
Businesses were, so the story goes, seen as anti-social agents whose profit-seeking needed to be restrained for other, supposedly loftier, goals, such as justice, social harmony, protection of the weak and even national glory. — Ha-Joon Chang

Businesses are great structures for managing big projects. It's like trying to develop the ability to walk without developing a skeleton. Once in a blue moon, you get an octopus, but for the most part, you get skeletons. Skeletons are good shit. — Cory Doctorow

Buffett's uncommon urge to chronicle made him a unique character in American life, not only a great capitalist but the Great Explainer of American capitalism. He taught a generation how to think about business, and he showed that securities were not just tokens like the Monopoly flatiron, and that investing need not be a game of chance. It was also a logical, commonsensical enterprise, like the tangible businesses beneath. He stripped Wall Street of its mystery and rejoined it to Main Street
a mythical or disappearing place, perhaps, but one that is comprehensible to the ordinary American. — Roger Lowenstein

One of the main lessons I have learned during my five years as Secretary-General is that broad partnerships are the key to solving broad challenges. When governments, the United Nations, businesses, philanthropies and civil society work hand-in-hand, we can achieve great things. — Ban Ki-moon

Which I think is great. I don't think there's nothing wrong with it. If you look in most professional sports, they're run by Jewish people. If you look at a lot of most successful corporations and stuff, more businesses, they're run by Jewish. It's not a knock, but they are some crafty people. — Michael Ray

Great businesses can be built on scale. I think Amazon has built a phenomenal commerce business largely on scale. Their network effect isn't obvious to me, but boy, have they used scale effectively. — Jeff Jordan

There's a tendency for those unfamiliar with cooperatives to look down on them as the leftovers of the mainstream economy, implying that if these ideologically driven people simply reorganized themselves into "normal" private companies, they would be more efficient and productive. In fact, just the opposite is true: Cooperatives often enter into economic activities that private businesses will not take on. The most fertile period of cooperative growth was during the Great Depression. Rural electric cooperatives spread across the American plains when it became clear that other investor-owned and municipally owned utilities were uninterested in wiring up sparsely populated regions. Credit unions, as we'll soon explore, have seen an upsurge during the recent financial crisis. — Michael Shuman

What basically happens is that when a company becomes great, and I'm being a bit rude here, people think they're some kind of genius. So now we can move into all sorts of other businesses because the net bottom line is, it's because we're just geniuses. They become overconfident and expand too far. — Jorgen Vig Knudstorp

It's called relationship building, and it's the foundation of great network marketing businesses. — Alex Theis

The world of business is becoming one of the great cathedrals of spirit. Businesses are becoming places in which meaning can be created, in which mutuality begins to happen. Business is the force in the world that is fulfilling every major value of the great spiritual traditions: intimacy, trust, a shared vision, cooperation, collaboration, friendship, and ultimately love. After all, what is love at its core? It is the movement of evolution to higher and higher levels of mutuality, recognition, union and embrace. — Marc Gafni

It would be great to take one city street and turn it into a pedestrian corridor and see what kind of effect it has on the businesses in that area - It's the future I think. — Stone Gossard

I didn't generate my success by being a prognosticator. I developed my reputation building our businesses by building great businesses and making them more efficient. — Michael Lee-Chin

Using [a stock's] volatility as a measure of risk is nuts. Risk to us is 1) the risk of permanent loss of capital, or 2) the risk of inadequate return. Some great businesses have very volatile returns - for example, See's [a candy company owned by Berkshire] usually loses money in two quarters of each year - and some terrible businesses can have steady results. — Charlie Munger

Maintaining the trust of the consumer is critical to our business. We live and breathe only one thing, which is wanting to connect consumers with great local businesses, and I don't feel we can do that if we don't have effective ways to prevent gaming of the system. — Jeremy Stoppelman

I'm going to start a lot of companies. These are not sham companies. These are great businesses. — Eric Lefkofsky

If the technology hadn't changed, [newspapers would] still be great businesses. Network TV [in its heyday,] anyone could run and do well. If Tom Murphy as running it, you'd do very well, but even your idiot nephew could do well. Fortunately, carbide cutting tools [such as those made by Iscar] don't have these types of substitutes. — Charlie Munger

For corporations to be bedfellows with the arts is good business for both. The architecture that houses a company is a more visible statement than the president's in the annual report. Ditto interiors, particularly of offices and sometimes, dramatically, in plants. For solvent businesses, support of community cultural undertakings in music, drama, dance creates great goodwill. Also, the existence of such activities is often important to the executives and their families that companies want to keep or attract to keep. — Malcolm Forbes

There is a beginning and end to all life - and to all human endeavors. Species evolve and die off. Empires rise, then break apart. Businesses grow, then fold. There are no exceptions. I'm OK with all that. Yet it pains me to bear witness to the sixth great extinction, where we humans are directly responsible for the extirpation of so many wonderful creatures and invaluable indigenous cultures. It saddens me to observe the plight of our own species; we appear to be incapable of solving our problems. — Yvon Chouinard

We spend a great deal of our energy making sure that small businesses have help in navigating to the outcomes that they want. — Karen Mills

If you look at America, one of the great strengths of America is its university towns and the way a lot of their businesses and a lot of their innovation and enormous economic growth have come from reducing that gap, getting those universities directly involved in start-up businesses, green field businesses, new development businesses. — Denis Napthine

In the marketplace, small businesses are the face and voice of humanity, which provides them with a great advantage in the Age of the Customer. — Jim Blasingame

The more successful enterprises are the more they try to replicate, duplicate, codify what makes us great. And suddenly they're inward thinking. They're thinking how can we continue to do what we've done in the past without understanding that what made them successful is to take risks, to change and to adapt and to be responsive. And so in a sense success breeds its own failure. And I think it's true of a lot of successful businesses. — Lou Gerstner

Personal brands have become anvils on which great businesses are forged — Bernard Kelvin Clive

The great virtue of free enterprise is that it forces existing businesses to meet the test of the market continuously, to produce products that meet consumer demands at lowest cost, or else be driven from the market. It is a profit-and-loss system. Naturally, existing businesses generally prefer to keep out competitors in other ways. That is why the business community, despite its rhetoric, has so often been a major enemy of truly free enterprise. — Milton Friedman

I think Buffett is a better investor than me because he has a better eye toward what makes a great business. And when I find a great business I'm happy to buy it and hold it. Most businesses don't look so great to me. — Seth Klarman

1. Investors give fund managers money at the wrong time. Now that you've had some time to read this book and understand the importance of buying stocks during fear cycles and holding during greed cycles, this first indicator should make sense. To understand this principle, imagine that you're the fund manager of a $100 billion investment fund. When the stock market crashes and you're able to purchase severely undervalued businesses with minimal debt, not only do you lack funds to invest, but all your resources are being depleted by scared investors. Instead of receiving money to buy the great deals, your investors are selling their shares in the fund and you don't have the capacity to take advantage of the market behavior. This reason alone severely handicaps fund managers as they attempt to beat the market. — Preston G. Pysh

great companies fail not because they want to avoid disruptive change but because they are reluctant to embrace promising new markets that might undermine their traditional businesses — Brad Stone

I think social networks are really working for the drivers, because we're able to talk directly to fans and they get first-hand information. And I think it's great for the partners as well and the businesses that are involved in Formula One. — Jenson Button

You look at Governor Romney's record in the private sector, he helped turn businesses around. Certainly a decade ago he took what would have been an international disaster with the U.S. Olympics, and turned it around for America and made us great again with the Olympics in Salt Lake City. — Scott Walker

If we want to sum up the theory of evolution by natural selection in two words, which have great relevance for all societies and businesses, we should simply remember: diversity works. — Richard Koch

The Lean Startup isn't just about how to create a more successful entrepreneurial business, it's about what we can learn from those businesses to improve virtually everything we do. I imagine Lean Startup principles applied to government programs, to healthcare, and to solving the world's great problems. It's ultimately an answer to the question: How can we learn more quickly what works, and discard what doesn't? — Tim O'Reilly

You hear all these great stories about kids starting their own businesses and getting involved in their communities and politics and foundations - all kinds of things. And it's so much easier for kids to get motivated and do that. [on her belief that teens are motivated to effect change.] — Alexis Bledel

Gold is a great thing to sew into your garments if you're a Jewish family in Vienna in 1939, but I think civilized people don't buy gold, they invest in productive businesses. — Charlie Munger

Part of being able to make great decisions around that and to really grow a business and scale a business, it also comes down to people. I spend a lot of time building teams at both businesses - both The Trump Organization and my own - and thinking about who to hire to supplement the team and allow us to best achieve our goals. — Ivanka Trump

Most businesses think that product is the most important thing, but without great leadership, mission and a team that deliver results at a high level, even the best product won't make a company successful. — Robert Kiyosaki

[Donald] Trump is underestimated greatly in terms of his understanding and comprehension of the great issues facing America. He understands trade. He's got businesses all over the world. He understands currency and how manipulating currency can be damaging to America. — Jeff Sessions

After 25 years of buying and supervising a great variety of businesses, Charlie [Munger] and I have not learned how to solve difficult business problems. What we have learned is to avoid them. To the extent we have been successful, it is because we have concentrated on identifying one-foot hurdles that we could step over rather than because we acquired any ability to clear seven-footers. — Warren Buffett

This kind of inequality - a level we haven't seen since the Great Depression - hurts us all. When middle-class families can no longer afford to buy the goods and services that businesses are selling, it drags down the entire economy, from top to bottom. America was built on the idea of broad-based prosperity - that's why a CEO like Henry Ford made it his mission to pay his workers enough so that they could buy the cars they made. It's also why a recent study showed that countries with less inequality tend to have stronger and steadier economic growth over the long run. — Barack Obama

Ninety-eight percent of all American companies have fewer than 100 employees. Over half of all Americans work for a small business. Small businesses are the backbone of our nation's economy and we must protect this great resource. Helping American small business is part of our movement for change and the end of politics as usual. — Barack Obama

Good businesses generate missions to drive their profits. Great businesses generate profits to drive their missions. — Tony Hsieh

I am not talking about rebelliousness, but giving people time for constructive internal reflection and even daydreaming. A lot of research is suggesting that the more that you demand people's external attention, the less chance you are allowing them to dip into the default mode where daydreams and reflection happen - and lot of great ideas are not going to come from the brute force of work but from personal life experience. Mind-wandering seems to be essential to the creative process, and I don't think a lot of businesses are aware of that fact. — Scott Barry Kaufman

I am a great believer that you need passion and energy to create a truly successful business. Remember many new businesses do not make it and running a business will be a tough experience, involving long hours and many hard decisions - it helps to have that passion to keep you going. — Richard Branson

Ms. Ellie Bockert Augsburger, owner of Creative Digital Studios, did a most excellent job. I feel compelled to mention that she had great ideas for Storm Warning. When asked to switch, she did so with ease, for this and many other reasons, I highly recommend her. In addition to cover art, she does graphic designs for businesses. She did a silhouette of an eagle similar to the one on Call Sign: Wrecking Crew (Wings of Eagles) for our business logo. — Lynn Hallbrooks

We really wake up every day trying to build businesses. That is the goal of private equity. It's a misnomer out there that private equity profits by shrinking companies. In fact, it's just the opposite. Private equity creates value by growing great companies. — Stephen Pagliuca

We have 400,000 small businesses forming every year in this country. How great is that? They are employing themselves, they are potentially employing others. The bad news is, we have 470,000 going out of business every year. And why? They cite Obamacare. — Ted Cruz

I don't have any great ambition to go out and make money. But I am still fascinated in starting up businesses and starting it in a way and running in a way that I want to do it. — Michael Birch

I don't really care about gossip. I care about building great businesses. — Tamara Mellon

I have set up several businesses as social businesses, and I am a great believer that the power of business should be used for good. — Lily Cole

There's a lot of good that's done for society in building businesses, but it's also great to be involved in those things where you can be connected to the community, to the world, and think about how you can use what you're creating, both in terms of your personal skills as well as your products or services to do good things for others. — Jeff Raikes

Commercial banks are very good for certain businesses, like loans and guarding other people's money. They're not great investors or entrepreneurs. — John Gutfreund

Just because you have the resources today doesn't mean the timing is right. No doubt, ambition and energy have led to the creation of many great businesses and careers, but timing is critical. — Nick Vujicic

Wrigley is a great business, but that doesn't solve the problem. Buying great businesses at advantageous prices is very tough. — Charlie Munger

The shareholders who own the businesses in this book have other, nonfinancial priorities in addition to their financial objectives. Not that they don't want to earn a good return on their investment, but it's not their only goal, or even necessarily their paramount goal. They're also interested in being great at what they do, creating a great place to work, providing great service to customers, having great relationships with their suppliers, making great contributions to the communities they live and work in, and finding great ways to lead their lives. They've learned, moreover, that to excel in all those things, they have to keep ownership and control inside the company and, in many cases, place significant limits on how much and how fast they grow. The wealth they've created, though substantial, has been a byproduct of success in these other areas. I call them small giants. — Bo Burlingham

Our Government is fostering economic growth in Kitchener, Cambridge and all of the Waterloo Region by investing in our innovative businesses. Today's announcement is a great example of how we are helping high-potential companies bring great ideas to market faster. Helping our entrepreneurs and original thinkers export their products and services to the rest of the world creates jobs, growth and economic prosperity here at home. — Gary Goodyear

I'm fighting for small businesses. I'm not fighting for big oil. Don't be confused. And there are thousands of businesses in this state that are at great risk. Meanwhile, the country keeps guzzling the oil, but we're out of work down here. We need to get back to work to build this region, and we intend to do so. — Mary Landrieu

All the present bureaucracies of political governments, great religious organizations, and all big businesses find that physical success for all humanity would be devastating to the perpetuation of their ongoing activities. This is because all of them are founded on the premise of ameliorating individual cases while generally exploiting on behalf of their respective political, religious, or business organizations the condition of no-where-nearly-enough-life-support-for-all and its resultant great human suffering and discontent. — R. Buckminster Fuller

Good design allows things to operate more efficiently, smoothly, and comfortably for the user. That's the real source of advantage. Businesses have started to understand this, so good design will become the price of entry ... Customers appreciate good design. While they can't necessarily point out what specifically makes it good, they know it feels better. There's a visceral connection. They are willing to pay for it, if you give them a great experience. — James P Hackett

Most people are great at absorbing information. Guerrilla marketing is needed because it gives small businesses a delightfully unfair advantage: certainty in an uncertain world, economy in a high-priced world, simplicity in a complicated world, marketing awareness in a clueless world. — Jay Conrad Levinson

I will say that Vertigo is an area of great interest to me. It is even less well tapped than other parts of DC, and could potentially offer amazing stories for our future television video game, digital and consumer products businesses. — Diane Nelson

The transaction reflects our disciplined strategy of investing capital in core businesses where we can leverage scale and expertise for competitive advantage. In addition to being a great strategic fit, the deal is compelling financially. — Jamie Dimon

Here in the Great Lakes region, a fourth year in a row of declining water levels has caused millions of dollars in losses for shipping companies, marinas and other businesses and prompted further restrictions on future water withdrawals for expanding suburbs. "A lot of people just can't believe that we may be running out of water, living this close to the Great Lakes," said Sarah Nerenberg, a water engineer with the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission, which conducted the study on shortages. — Timothy Egan

Change makes us confront the great unknown. It introduces different things into our lives. Different places. Different ideas. Different people. It's all hard to accept at times, and change can often be a little scary. But if there's one fact that I've learned from raising a family, from running several businesses, from serving in Congress and now as Governor, it's that nothing has ever grown without changing. — Bob Riley

There would really be no reason to get up in the morning if Founders Fund was not willing to invest in companies that were doing important things, great businesses that very few people believe in. — Luke Nosek

Steve Jobs was a great friend as well as a trusted advisor. His legacy will extend far beyond the products he created or the businesses he built. It will be the millions of people he inspired, the lives he changed, and the culture he defined. — Bob Iger

People who instinctively establish a strong network of relationships have always created great businesses. — Keith Ferrazzi

Small businesses want things streamlined, and one of the great successes we're having is less paperwork, faster turnaround times. — Karen Mills

Mindset fuels behavior... Great lives, great relationships, great businesses, and great love stories are cultivated from within. — Steve Maraboli

What has a great value to us as a nation is the internet itself. The internet is critical infrastructure to the United States. We use the internet for every communication that businesses rely on every day. — Edward Snowden

Aside from the movies, examples of positive-Black Swan businesses are: some segments of publishing, scientific research, and venture capital. In these businesses, you lose small to make big. You have little to lose per book and, for completely unexpected reasons, any given book might take off. The downside is small and easily controlled. The problem with publishers, of course, is that they regularly pay up for books, thus making their upside rather limited and their downside monstrous. (If you pay $10 million for a book, your Black Swan is it not being a bestseller.) Likewise, while technology can carry a great payoff, paying for the hyped-up story, as people did with the dot-com bubble, can make any upside limited and any downside huge. It is the venture capitalist who invested in a speculative company and sold his stake to unimaginative investors who is the beneficiary of the Black Swan, not the "me, too" investors. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

On the basis of his work each person is fully entitled to consider himself a part owner of the great workbench at which he is working with everyone else. A way toward that goal could be found by associating labor with the ownership of capital joint ownership of the means of work, sharing by the workers in the management and/or profits of businesses, so-called shareholding by labor, etc. — Pope John Paul II