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A DANCE THROUGH THE FIRES OF TIME

9503 CONSUMER REVOLUTIONS –1960s part 2

In 1962 I left Imperial College and started to build my career. I had to put my revolutionary tendencies behind me, but even so I still still had something approaching a radical ambition for I had long wanted to be an entrepreneur. Accordingly, I then saw being a member of the board, and preferably its CEO, as the route to this. Because it involved so many aspects of commerce, and then was at the leading edge of business, I chose to start my career in marketing. This was where, at the time, the leading-edge action was . We were the advance guard of the new of society.

Within seven years I was to be close to my objective. I was to be in general management, promised a seat on the board of one of the major multinationals! But the first step on the ladder was a lowly position with an advertising agency. Such agencies were, at the time, still where the marketing action was. It was at a time not long after Doris Day and Rock Hudson had glamorized the whole world of advertising; and account executives were the YUPPIES of their day.

Thus it was I became an assistant market executive.  This wasn't quite the tea-boy, but it was definitely an assistant job.  We – FCB (Foote Cone & Belding) -- to be precise were the London branch of the American advertising agency. In the agency the key group was made up of the account executives and the account directors; those iconic individuals who you would have seen in the films of the 1960s.  Backing them up were the creative departments, described in my later marketing books, and the media buyers, also featured in my books.  FCB was, though, unusual in also having a group of marketing specialists who provided expert marketing support for the account teams.  This is where I found myself.

We supported a range of different products.  In my time there I supported Kleenex tissues, Watney’s beer, G-Plan furniture, Smedley's food, and in particular Dial soap.

My first job for, though, was to summarise the latest results from the various audit services which had been commissioned to support the Dial soap project. I should at this stage explain that Dial soap had long been the brand leader in the US, but was only then, in 1962, due to be first launched in the UK. Its owners, Armour (kings of the stockyard in Chicago, where the cattle industry had led to an accompanying soap industry), made several major mistakes.  The first of these was that Dial in the US had made its name on the back of the slogan '24-hour protection' -- where it was a deodorant soap -- but Sunlight soap (owned by Lever Brothers) had already used this slogan to conquer the equivalent market sector in the UK. 

Possibly the biggest mistake they made, however, was to employ FCB, an advertising agency, to do a whole marketing job for them -- including brand management. The wayward nature of this was perhaps evidenced by the debates on the media spend, where the FCB executives nervously debated whether they needed to spend any more money on advertising -- well aware that any increase would also give the agency 10% of any extra spend as their share of the media costs!  Though I was involved in the marketing, I have to admit that this was not the best run brand launch I was ever involved in! Even so, it gave me my first taste of brand management, and put my foot firmly on the ladder to this.

Indeed, the first project I had to undertake when I joined Foote Cone & Belding was for Dial soap.  Determined to get the best retail information, in particular, the account team had bought into two retail audits (Nielsen and BMRB), and the one dustbin audit (Attwoods).  Once a month, therefore, as the reports came into FCB the account group had to make a presentation to the American clients. My job, therefore, was to summarise - for the account group - the latest movements on these three audits.  This sounds like it should have been easy.  With three different sources the facts should have been that much more accurate.  The problem was that the three almost invariably disagreed with each other.  It wasn't even a matter of absolute levels, all three would show different trends; one would be rising while one another would be falling!  The moral of this is not that you should not use retail audits, they offer useful information though sometimes of dubious accuracy, but you are not just wasting money taking three versions -- you are confusing everyone. Above all you must understand the levels of accuracy which apply to such figures; something even opinion pollsters tend to forget.

I well remember my first assignment. The figures had already been averaged across the two retail audits, and I was asked to recalculate the overall figure for the brand share.  The reason for this was that the audits had changed the proportion of chemist outlets they used and hence the ratio between these had changed marginally.  I realised straight away that all I had to do was to take the existing shares and just multiply them by the changes in the ratio.  Being who I am, though, I went back to basics.

Had I done as I was told, I would have come out with the required brand share figure; accurate to within .01 per cent.  What I noticed, however, was that - since they had started tracking the brand share figure - the whole basis of their assumptions had been undermined.  In particular the brand share they were looking for was based on the assumption that the brand would gain the position of fourth in the marketplace.  In fact the brand shares overall had changed to such an extent that their brand share would now put them in the position of second in the marketplace; moving up two places without any obvious reason for this!  I proceeded to tell my bosses this was the case, only to be told (as I was so many times later in my career), that I should do what I was told. They then presented the Americans the new share position, accurate to 0.01%!

Dial went into test market in the Northeast, and there were some amusing incidents en route. Thus, a high-pressure line in the Cussons soap-making factory (they were making the soap for Dial), exploded while the account team were there - covering the whole factory and the account team with layers of soap. Despite this they still managed to produce the requisite quantities of toilet soap. Not only that but the product was high quality and did everything it claimed to do; which was not always the case with new products, as I found out later!

Having said all that, the test market did some good, since Armour pulled out after they realised the likely scale of the resulting marketing disaster which emerged from the audit figures. They probably saved themselves a fortune. More important, personally, it gave me a very good grounding in marketing, and in particular brand management, which later became my forte.

The agency provided a very pleasant environment, full of anecdotal stories.  Thus I remember an account executive going out with one of the beer salesmen -- and coming back in at noon absolutely blotto.  The same account executive, who was later off work for a week so, with the flu, scandalised his neighbours by having a 40 foot Watneys trailer stop outside his suburban front door, delivering a case of Watneys beer.

Most of the stories, though, were told about clients. Thus Wallace Smedley, who was managing director of Smedley foods, daily used to go down to the production line for Spaghetti Bolognese -- then its main line -- and taste the sauce.  Based on his hunches, almost every day he would change the formulation; making it almost impossible to maintain brand quality!  He also proudly took the account team into the works canteen, and explained to them just how democratic it was. There were no class distinctions, everyone ate there and helped themselves on the same self-service line. Accordingly, they went off and helped themselves in this way, only to find - when they got back to the table - Wallace Smedley was being served separately by his own team of waiters!

G Plan was almost bad. They had one director who was known as Mr 100%.  Whenever he was asked a question he would inevitably say “I agree with Leslie (Leslie Gomme was the owner) 100 percent”.  It was rumoured that once, when Leslie wasn't there, he replied “I agree with what Leslie would have said”!  Their great venture, during the time I was on the account, was building a totally new factory in high Wycombe; on the site of one of their old factories. The problem they discovered, too late, was that it was approached by such a narrow bridge that they could only ship out half the production of the new factory.

We, in the marketing group, weren't allowed anywhere near clients, but even so the glamour of the whole thing rubbed off on us.  I remember going with the group to the musical 'How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying'.  The musical was about an American advertising agency, and I remember sitting with my friends laughing at totally different jokes to those enjoyed by the rest of the audience.  The esprit de corps was amazing. We thought we were the best ever.  We produced beautiful reports for clients; before the days of Xerox we had our own line of AB Dick litho printers to produce these beautifully printed documents. In the process the agency also did some very good advertising.

One of my chores was to go round a few of the local supermarkets, to check up on what special offers were in place; so that we could report these to our clients.  This was something of a chore, but it had the one distinct advantage that I had to buy lots of products, which I could then use at home. I should point out that my salary then was the grand total of £600 per annum! 

Even so, it was, as I have already said, a pleasant environment. For example, after lunch - which was taken in the canteen in the mews at the back of the offices - we would retire to the table tennis room. I was fortunate enough for my partner, Philip, to be a county tennis player. It really was a fun life.

At Foote Cone & Belding  the social lives of Pat and myself went up several notches.  There was the annual Christmas party, of course, but being an advertising agency it was much more lavish than normal. It was fancy dress and I went to it dressed as one of our clients’ packets of tea, since I had to strip off the stuff at the end of the evening and make a quick exit; where we were going to Pat’s parents home that evening.  I remember Pat being very jealous of one of the girls in the PR department who was wearing a Mary Quant original which she had managed to scrounge as part of her work!

One interesting aspect, though, was that just before the dance I was in the lift with one of the young girls in the agency – a rather attractive brunette – who offered me a bed for the weekend!  This was only just into the swinging sixties so I was surprised and, newly-wed, I reacted by refusing.  I'm not certain I would do the same now!

The main features of my social life though were provided by Peter Bartlett, with whom I worked.  Peter was the son of a vicar, and moved in elevated circles.  I remember him explaining that his father had done the traditional thing and put down a pipe of port for him when he was born.  A pipe was something over 50 gallons.  Unfortunately Peter found, when it came time for him to inherit this, his father had already drunk it all.  Peter was a great character, but his days of following his father into the church were rather abruptly ended when he was caught in the church yard with some of the choirboys!

Peter had a maisonette in South Kensington.  It was a very elegant maisonette, and he held wonderful parties there – to which we regularly went.  He served an absolutely wicked punch.  It was white wine diluted with vodka.  It tasted just like apple juice, and everyone drank far too much.  Every time we went there Pat and I had to stop at South Kensington Tube station, while she went to the ladies and was sick!

The interesting thing, though, was the clientele of these parties.  As I have said, he moved in elevated circles, and almost everyone at the party would be an honourable this or honourable that.  In those days the second sons of the gentry, with whom he mixed, were given the title honourable.  They were lovely people and were some of the most unassuming people I've ever met.

The further background, I should explain, was that this was the time of the Profumo affair; when Stephen Ward's girlfriends entrapped the Conservative defence Minister. Stephen Ward himself committed suicide in prison.  It was a wonderful time to be in an advertising agency, since all the most colourful stories about what was going on couldn't be published.  The rule, therefore, was that when you got in first thing in the morning you found out what the grapevine had to say about the latest developments.  The Daily Express had set itself up as the news clearing agency and passed on the latest information minute by minute to all the advertising agencies; so we were well and truly up-to-date with who was doing what to whom.  It was interesting that far more government ministers were involved one way or another than ever reached the headlines, or even was mentioned in the Denning report -- which clearly was something of a whitewash.  But it was notable that all these ministers quietly disappeared from the government ranks in the year following!

All of this was also very relevant to an experience at one of Peter's parties.  It was almost traditional that Peter used to have two of his girlfriends at each of these parties, and they used to fight each other -- albeit verbally -- to see who would get Peter for that night.  On this occasion four of us were standing together, myself and another guy opposite to each other with Peter’s two girlfriends facing each other between us.  In line with the tradition one of these girls made a catty remark about the other's low-cut dress. At this point the other girl, who was one of the crowd that ran with Stephen Ward and Profumo, leaned across grabbed the neckline of the other girl’s dress, together with her bra, and pulled them forward so that everything she had was exposed to all of us. To justify this she said “... well you've got nothing to show have you duckie”, before slapping the bra back into place.  Myself and the other guy had looked down, fascinated at what proved to be a very nubile pair of bare breasts, and a number of other people around the room had also turned to see the same sight -- though not as well as we could. The real fascination was, however, that - as soon as the bra had loudly slapped back into place - everyone turned back and carried on talking as if nothing had happened.  This was, I think, a function of upper-class politeness rather than the onset of the naughty Sixties. 

Peter had a lot of stories about these encounters.  Thus, one time he had accidentally left the front door open, even though he was making quite passionate love on the hearthrug with the girl from the Stephen Ward group, when someone walked in stood over them. At this point the girl looked up and, without halting in her stride, said - pointing to the stains on the hearthrug – “...well it's obviously not the first time is it”!

Peter was also a great gambler.  In fact he ran a private chemie table, which in those days was quite illegal. He used a clear about £600 every time he ran the table.  But he spent all his winnings from these games, going round other people's illegal chemi tables.  He claimed that he had to do this in order to advertise.  In reality he was the sort of addicted gambler who assumed that, if you had had four heads in a row when tossing a coin, the next one must be a tail.  We could never persuade him that statistically still had to be a 50-50 chance.

In particular I remember one evening, when we had persuaded him to go to bed early.  He came in the following morning looking absolutely haggard.  It turned out that he had woken up in the middle of the night and, not used to going to bed before the early hours, had become bored with nothing to do. So he went off to Esmeralda's barn (a legal gaming club), where he dropped £600 in one-hour.  It should be pointed out that my salary at that time was £600 per annum! 

After a while our flat in Fulham was needed for a relative of the landlady, so we were forced to move yet again.

Our new, temporary, abode was in West Hampstead -- just by West Hampstead station and really on the outskirts of Kilburn.  It was a largish flat at the top of an old house – which has been long since demolished to make way for new multi-story flats - but the lady who owned it had locked off her own bedroom with all her treasures stored in it.  Even so we had a large living room, kitchen, bathroom and the large second bedroom; which overlooked gardens full of apple trees – a marvellous sight in spring. 

We had it for six months or so.  It was good for my work at FCB, since I just had to get the Bakerloo line to Baker Street and then walk down to the agency.  Mind you the tube was so crowded in the morning that you didn't have to hang onto the straps provided. The bodies pressed against you held you upright by themselves! During a later tube strike I was waiting for one of the few trains which was running. When it arrived it was packed full. I just managed to force my way inside the door. By two stops later, others had done the same behind me and I found myself in the middle of the carriage! I was standing opposite, and very close, to an especially nubile young girl; whose dress buttoned down the front. As the train rocked backwards and forward I was fascinated to see though that her dress, rubbing against my suit, was slowly unbuttoning. I was even more fascinated to see what was revealed, a very skimpy bra – just about holding in a firm young breast! There was nothing either of us could do to stop the progress, which luckily went no further before she was able to leave the train! So there were compensations to peak hour tube travel after all.

Indeed, it's funny what you remember.  Thus I remember the first part of the winter of 1962/1963 for being a week-long fog.  These smogs were common in those days, before the millions of coal fires were regulated. On the other hand, this one was so bad that, as I walked up 'Shoot Up Hill' towards the flat, the cars were bumping into each other; but this was because they were rolling backwards, since the drivers didn't realise they were slipping back down the hill.  That was followed by one of the worst winters in living memory, when the snow lay on the ground for months.

It was during this time the Pat decided to have her back operated on.  She had suffered from a slipped disc for some time, and had been constantly returning to Westminster hospital - to be strapped up in corsets or even to have a plaster cast around her middle -- but none of these really solved the problem.  Eventually they offered to fuse her spine together, around the slipped disc, hoping – by this drastic intervention - to cure the problem.  What they only told her afterwards was that they had stopped doing this for several years since they had paralysed a number of previous patients doing this!  She was just about the first new patient that they had tried it on!  Luckily she survived, and it helped her back afterwards; though I later learned how she felt when I developed a slipped disc myself.

She came out of hospital just before Christmas and I set out to give her the best Christmas possible.  Thus I descended on Fortnum & Mason's wine department. As well as buying six crystal wine glasses, I bought two bottles of wine.  The first of these was a bottle of champagne to celebrate her coming out from hospital. It was Krug Special Cuvee; just about the best you could get.  The other was even better.  It was a Les Montrachet, the only premier cru white burgundy.  It must have been good because the shop assistant handed it to me with the comment “You will certainly enjoy that sir”.  It was almost worth the price just for that whispered accolade in Fortnums.  In fact it was a beautiful wine and one of the few premier cru I've actually tasted.

After Christmas, while the snow was still on the ground, we used to go walking on Hampstead Heath, which was only one stop away on the British Railways line. The snow was beautiful, crisp under foot, and it was gorgeously sunny.

There wasn't much in the way of haute cuisine while we lived there, but not too far away there was a nice middle European restaurant where we ate borscht. But this was nothing like the Rice Bowl in South Kensington where we used to eat before. In my student days we ate there, in the coffee bar downstairs, and feasted on Chinese curries. Sadly it was demolished as part of the enlargement of South Kensington station. When we could afford it we had also eaten in the nearby Indian restaurant; savouring their pilaus.

Once more we moved, this time down to the borders of Chelsea.  It was officially Chelsea, but really Fulham -- since it was World's End, and the worst part at that.  It was in Slaidburn Street, which was a little cul-de-sac off King's Road.  Even while we were there that part of Kings Road became very trendy with boutiques like 'Granny Takes a Trip' being set up.  But our street, with its small terraced houses, never moved up-market.

 

Pat found it, and I still think the main thing that attracted her was that it had a refrigerator thrown in - a great luxury in those days!  We had the bottom half of a house with a living room, dining-room and kitchen on the ground floor and the bedroom on the first floor -- where our neighbours above also used to have their bedroom (their living room was on the top floor).  It was not really a proper flat since we lived cheek by jowl with these neighbours, but they were lovely people and, particularly when Sarah came along, they were very friendly towards her and us.

The main problem was transport.  It was in one of the dead holes of London transport.  There was no tube station anywhere near and the bus services were not brilliant.  Hence I had to take a number of buses to get to FCB, but it was worthwhile since it was a comfortable flat.  As such, it was when we started to gather our furniture.  There was some furniture already there but we bought our first sets of Ladderax shelving, which we continued collecting for years afterwards and still have! 

The kitchen was reasonably equipped, though we added to it our first twin tub washing machine -- which was the usual machine in those days (with one tub for washing and one for spin drying).  The television, still black and white in those days, was one of first cable televisions and provided a good picture.

We lived there for four happy years.  In this time both Sarah and Miles were born, and I changed jobs twice.  You are supposed to remember where you were when Kennedy was assassinated. Well Pat and I were at home at Slaidburn Street watching television! 

While we were at Slaidburn Street we joined the English Stage Society. This supported the English Stage Company -- in other words George Devine’s Company at the Royal Court Theatre. This was in Sloane Square, at the other end of Kings Road.  We, accordingly, became avid theatregoers, mainly at the Royal Court. Under George Devine, this was then the leading avant-garde theatre.  Thus we saw wide range of works by Arnold Wesker, including the Kitchen, and of other contemporary writers -- especially John Osborne and Brecht. As members of the society we were also able to go to Sunday 'platform' performances of banned plays. This was still in the days when the Lord Chanberlain maintained an iron grip on what you could see. In this context I particularly remember a production of Wedekind's 'Spring Awakening', which was a fine play.

We used to go regularly to the Royal Court, and put up with the sound of the trains rumbling underneath and the gents loos flushing at the back of the stalls!  Regrettably the Royal Court decided it had to modernise and the price for this, when as usual the cost escalated, was that it had to switch to a more popular repertoire.  George Devine resigned at that point, and soon after committed suicide. We resigned in sympathy – though the fact that Sarah had just arrived was also a contributing factor. We had worked out we couldn't any longer find the time, or the money, to go to the theatre so much.

This was a time also when we used to go regularly to the Festival Hall to hear the various orchestras.  We had our favourites, the LSO London Symphony Orchestra being the best of them -- having Barry Tuckwell on horn and Leone Goossens on oboe.  We saw a range of conductors, including Klemperer who then conducted the Philharmonia.  He was in his later years and perched himself on a high school -- always looking as if he might fall off it any minute.  He specialised in Brahms and we saw a number of the Brahms symphonies, though I wasn't all that enamoured of them. Later on, when I heard them done less sombrely, I did come to like them! He was a stickler for detail.  I remember one performance when, after the interval, he struck up the orchestra and was five or ten minutes into the piece when he suddenly stopped and looked, scowling, across at a point in the orchestra. At this stage a musician -- making himself as small as he could -- crept around to where the Klemperer was looking.  Obviously he had missed getting on stage after the interval. Klemperer, still glaring at the musician, took us right back to the start of the piece and then through it in its entirety!.

We saw a number of singers as well.  We attended a concert by Maria Callas, which cost a fortune; something like £50 per ticket (several hundred pounds per ticket these days), though she was on her last legs and was more of a mezzo soprano.  Even so she sang like an angel, and had a genuine presence -- one of real star quality.  But our favourite soprano was Victoria de Los Angeles, who had the most beautiful voice we have ever heard. She used to sing a range of songs, in particular the 'Songs of Auvergne' by Cantaloupe which I still love. We also heard Elizabeth Schwarzkopf, the other great soprano of the time (but German and famed for her lieder). She was crisply superb but I preferred the warmer tones of Victoria. Surprisingly, though, we didn't go to the opera - except for one cycle of Wagner's Ring, with Birgit Nielsen who was superb and Hans Hotter who wasn't . Pat didn't like opera until she sang in the chorus of Opera Milton Keynes many years later!

For orchestral music I preferred the Festival Hall to the Albert Hall, since in those days - before they had the clouds in the roof - the Albert Hall was a disaster. In one of our few visits I thought heard the organ start-up, but couldn't see anyone in the organ loft and found, to my horror, that it was actually the pianist with the sound so distorted that it was like an organ. So we always went to the Festival Hall, which was very dry (as I like it), and never went to the Albert Hall.  Other people prefer more resonance in their halls, but I like a musicalogical approach and dryness suits me down the ground.

We attended one performance which turned out to be the first performance of Pierre Boulez, with the London Symphony Orchestra.  It changed our lives.  It was rated, in The Times the following day, as the concert of the decade -- and I think it probably was.  Pierre Boulez is an absolutely brilliant conductor even when he's conducting music which is not in the modern idiom.  No one can beat him for conducting Webern, or even his own music, but we also heard him deliberately take Mozart at half the pace so that it sounded just like Beethoven: which was exactly the sound that he wanted to demonstrate.  The problem was that he was so good that he put us off all the other conductors. When he went back to Paris we gave up on our music – though, again, the advent of Sarah had a lot to do with the decision.

The third leg of our culture was the National Film Theatre, where we used to go regularly to see the whole range of classical films.  In particular in those days -- and even now -- we loved Eisenstein's films; and even sat through a six-hour session at the NFT where they showed every single one of the rushes Eisenstein made in Mexico for his uncompleted film Que Viva Mexico.  You were supposed to appreciate how the film had developed, take by take, but I am not certain that it was as entertaining as his other firms!

We also used to go to the London Film Festival, and the best value at this was the overnight session. We used to start at eleven o'clock at night and watch three complete programmes through the night, before we staggered home at 7 o'clock in the morning.  In the middle we were served soup on the embankment, in the moonlight.  It was a very good experience, but so tiring.  The film I remember best was one that no-one else has ever heard about. It was called Hallelujah the Hills, directed by Adolph Mekas, and it was a described as follow-on to Hellzapoppin. It was very, very strange but so creative!

All that went the way of such things with the arrival of Sarah

Having tasted some aspects of brand management, while I was working in FCB, I determined to move into the mainstream of brand management.  Accordingly, I circulated my details to the whole range of consumer companies.  Indeed, I produced a very well presented document. This was copied on the Gestetner copiers in the library where Pat was still working.  It was something of a gimmick, which I had seen reported in the trade magazines, but it did eventually get me in through the door of PST, and impressed the personnel director there.

PST was the proprietary pharmaceuticals part of an American multinational.  Its sister company in the UK was Winthrop, which handled the ethical pharmaceuticals; the difference between the two being that ethical pharmaceuticals had to be prescribed through a doctor, and couldn't be advertised, whereas proprietary pharmaceuticals were sold over-the-counter and in some cases were heavily advertised; as indeed was a case with most PST products.

PST had set out to be the leading brand management company in the UK.  It had a large number of brand managers for its size, almost a dozen - with three or four marketing managers over them. It had hired these managers from the leading brand management companies; in particular Procter & Gamble and (then Hedley in the UK) which was the leading brand management company worldwide – as it still is, albeit in a rather different form. 

The brand manager at PST was, at that time, the king of the company.  He (there were then no female brand managers) lived up to the dictum, in those days, that the brand manager was to his brand what the managing director was to the company.  Brand managers ran everything on the brand, from purchasing and production through to advertising and promotion.  The result was a matrix structure, where there were - for example - production managers who ran the factory -- handling the whole range of products -- but who worked to the instructions of the individual brand managers on the specific products they were producing for them.  The same applied across the company, except that the brand managers actually ran all the advertising and promotion directly.

I entered as a trainee, and spent the first six months in the salesforce.  In fact they had two salesforces, one calling on grocers and one calling on chemists.  I spent three months in each, though in case of the grocery salesforce I was a merchandiser and not a full salesman.  This meant that I went round the territory and ‘sold in’ just the promotional material, which was much more important in those days before supermarkets.

It was an eye-opener.  It was a traditional sales operation which, with the advent of supermarkets, has now largely disappeared.  In those days, however, it hadn't changed for decades.  We still had to have hats, trilbies, which I never wore; since these had by then disappeared from even mainstream fashion. Even so, I still had to carry one around with me -- frequently having to rush back to shop where I had left it by mistake -- since this was thought to be a mark of respect for the shopkeeper.

For merchandisers the skill was going in and using the sales line “...should I put the display here or there?” We never gave the customer chance of saying no. Most that time I put displays into branches which had been agreed with their head offices, and even that was difficult since the local managers hated displays being erected in their beautiful shops.

In those days the shops, even grocery shops, used to have counters and the assistants served from behind these.  The display material therefore was in the former display cards, which could be put on shelves, and window stickers which were plastic strips that could be stuck on the outside of the window.  We played rather dirty and had ones which were very difficult to scrape off!  Best of all were pieces of display which actually contained the stock, small ones on the counter and - above all - large dump-bins which would hold whole case of the product on the floor.  We had target numbers for all of these, and were judged by what percentage we achieved.

The second three months I moved on to selling to chemist shops.  In this case I went in and actually persuaded the shopkeeper -- the chemist in this case (usually an independent in those days) that he should buy more products from us.  This used all the range of techniques, typically saying -- using our records from previous visits –“...last time you seemed to be selling very well, so shouldn’t I put you down for two dozen this time?”.  It was tradition that has now disappeared, though most sales techniques -- taught by sales trainers – until recently seemed to still be focused on this aspect of life.

The great thing about this job was that I had a company car; a Cortina which was then the salesmen's standard car.  Even so life proved something of a chore during those six months, but I learnt a lot from this sales experience.  However, retail outlets have changed beyond recognition since those days.  As I have said, almost all the shops I visited were counter service; supermarkets were rare in those days -- and even then were quite small (below 5,000 square feet, and not much bigger than some of today’s convenience stores).  In the case of food retailers, for example, the housewife wrote down her list at home and then told the assistant what was wanted -- whereupon the assistant would rush around all the shelves, behind the counter, picking out the items that she wanted.

Eventually, after my six months on the road selling to PST’s retailers, I joined the brand management team; as an assistant brand manager, very much learning the ropes.  I was assistant brand manager on Delrosa, one of PST's biggest brands.  This was a vitamin C drink for children, and especially babies.

The history of it was that, in the Second World War, there had been problem in that citrus fruit, which provided vitamin C, was in short supply. So when the government laboratories found that rosehips contained vitamin C, they sent schoolchildren out into the countryside collecting rosehips from the hedgerows.  These were forwarded to PST where they were processed into syrup which contained vitamin C. If you think about it, the idea of giving rosehip syrup to small babies, especially where they had been picked from the hedgerows by schoolchildren, would be anathema to modern mothers who wanted everything hygienic for their children.  But in the Second World War they had no alternative and a great tradition had been born. Production of rosehip syrup continued after the war ended, even when it was no longer needed.  In fact, when I was a PST during the 1960s it was still obligatory for mothers to give it to their babies.  PST's brand, Delrosa, was the brand leader by a long way; and was very profitable. Paradoxically, by that time artificial vitamin C had been created, and this was stuffed into the product by the barrow load; so it could have been any sort of syrup - the rosehips were maintained simply so that mothers were reassured that it was as good as ever!

Neville Teller was my brand manager and I learned an immense amount from him.  I worked under him for a year or so, before he went off to become general manager of the Solicitors Law Society Stationery Company.  Neville was particularly interested in the creative side of the promotional material, and taught me great deal about that.  We produced a lot of display material, and Neville handled this from inception through to the finished product.  We were involved in everything, even investigating the individual screen dots on the product’s label with linen testers; the industry’s name for the small magnifying glasses we used. 

Our main advertising medium was television and I well remember my first experience of making a television commercial.  When I turned up at the studio door, filming was already under way.  When the red light went out, I walked through the door and facing me was a brightly lit mother and child. As I turned to the right, however, I saw something like 40 people stacked up behind the camera. This was not just feather-bedding, for all these were needed.  You needed the carpenter, for example, in case someone decided to move the scenery. Grips were needed to move the lights around. Indeed, the cameraman didn't operate the camera, but directed the lighting; deciding where the various floods and spots should go.

Brand managers ran all aspects of the brand, making certain that we had the correct stocks and developing the product itself.  By the time I left the product contained more apple pectin than rose hips, and the vitamin C came entirely from the artificial content.  This was one reason why I left, or was forced out, since I was threatening to whistle-blow. There was nothing wrong with putting in pectin in this way, but PST chose to falsify the label - so that the customers didn't realise what was happening.  That was a crime, and is still a crime.  But they thought that nobody could easily detect whether it was apple pectin or rosehips. But I reasoned that all that was required was for the authorities to ask for our production records to see exactly what was happening! 

Rather strangely, even for a brand management operation, we were heavily involved in media buying.  Usually this was left entirely to the agency. Thus, I had Bensons (our advertising agency for Delrosa) do the actual buying, but we had a meeting with them once a month in which they presented their media buying record. At that meeting it had become a tradition that we tore their work to shreds. It was an awful experience for the agency, since we usually knew better than them what was the best buy. I well remember the account director of Bensons, who was desperate to keep us happy, once coming in and saying that he had managed to get some Coronation Street spots; in those days Coronation Street spots had been worth their weight in gold -- since Coronation Street had by far the biggest audiences.  Unfortunately, this was just at the time when BBC had launched Steptoe and Son and this had decimated the Coronation Street audiences -- and we had been desperately offloading all of our existing Coronation Street spots!  We were very hard nosed, it was a very macho operation, and we really made the agency personnel squirm.

After Neville Teller left, for a few months I ran the brand; until another brand manager was promoted into his place. I was eventually moved to be brand manager on some small brands. Whatever the brand, the brand manager in PST was in an immensely powerful position, and needless to say I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I even got as far as ordering a new production line for Delrosa. We had been running out of supplies, and the production management were loathe to order the new line themselves. So I contacted our American superiors and got them to order one for me.  Unfortunately, not long after this, sales dropped off and the second production line was not really needed! 

On the advertising side, I had problems with the agency’s creative strategy.  The idea of Delrosa advertising was that it was beautifully bright and hygienic. Remember mothers had to feed this to their young babies; so everything we showed in our television commercials was high key and beautifully sterile.  The agency, unfortunately, hired a new creative head and, with his first storyboard, he tried to sell us the idea that we had to be much more basic. He wanted to use an Italian ‘earth mother’ to sell the product.  Hence the storyboard showed an Italian earth mother with a bottle shoved into the mouth of the baby -- in what looked like a Naples tenement -- saying '...you wanta giva your baby Delrosa..' in an Italian accent. We were horrified, and told them to get rid of it.  But once creative personnel have got a bee in their bonnet it is very difficult indeed to get it out again. Thus, they commissioned a pilot commercial -- which Bensons paid for themselves -- and again told us what a beautiful commercial it was.  We patiently sat through this experimental commercial, but still thought it was rubbish and rejected it. To their horror, we ourselves eventually wrote a script based on our normal approach, and I even attended the casting sessions -- to make certain that no earth mother managed to crawl under the door!  I even went onto the set and, having specified that all lighting should be high key, looked through the lens in every shot. Even then I was beaten into the ground, since what I couldn't see was the settings for the exposure. The end result was that the lighting had been set to low-key and it was as if we were looking into an Italian tenement.  We had to scrap the commercial: and cut a new one from previous stock!

I was more successful in other respects.  Beechams, having seen how profitable our brand was, set out to take us head on with their own product, which was based on jojoba beans. Beechams were a real threat, since in the UK they were a much bigger company. In classical style they decided to put it into two test towns in Yorkshire. Our idea, which became classical in later years, was to destroy the test market.  Although our main advertising was on television, I whipped the agency into producing a new full-page press ad within a week; and we then had it running in every issue of the local papers.  We flooded the area with salespeople, and display material.  Worst of all, from Beechams point of view, we ran a permanent 12 for 10 promotion in these towns.  At one stage almost half the output of our factory was going to these towns, though much of this was then sold on to elsewhere in the country!  The net result, though, was that the Beechams test was absolutely useless.  I later heard that its board meeting had cursed my name, since -- although they wanted to launch nationally -- they eventually decided that it was too risky.  If you want to save your brand, this is the way to do it.

Indeed we were quite vicious towards our competition. There was another competitive product, made by small manufacturer, called Optrose.  One of the main means of promotion, in those days, was through mother and baby clinics -- where we provided supplies of Delrosa to them to sell on to their mothers.  Optrose had been buying into this business, simply by beating us on price.  This was starting to hurt us in terms of brand share.  So my boss met with the managing director of Optrose, in a discreet hotel off Heathrow, and quite simply told them that if they ever reached a 10 percent share that would be the day they went bankrupt!  Even in those days this was illegal -- but fortunately I was not involved.

Our promotional activities were very wide ranging. We used to produce packs for distribution of samples in these baby clinics.  I even ran a newspaper, called Antenatal News, and with this I helped at least one leading journalist, Clare Rayner, on the way to her career; and 40 years later, when I met her again, she still remembered this.  I even became a record producer, producing an EP of nursery songs as part of a promotion.

I learned the principles of strategic planning at PST. It did everything – by the book - that was ever recommended, for example, in terms of brand planning.  Thus, once a year, we were required to produce two documents for each brand.  The first was the brand strategy which said what the strategy was -- in some detail.  On the other hand, this contained no background. That was provided in the brand facts book, the contents of which were collected over the year – and which was backed up by the extensive files of market research evidence we held. The second document was the brand plan, which described how the brand strategy was to be implemented over the following year.

This was exactly as the Harvard Business School would have recommended; but was not the practice followed in most other companies. 

It was a rigorous exercise.  Most rigorous of all, we were allowed only one (quarto) piece of paper, albeit on both sides, for each document. The result of this was that we, or at least our secretaries, had typewriters with the smallest typeface ever. But I believe it was a very productive exercise, cutting out all extraneous distractions.

As far as possible the contents, the brand plan in particular, were quantified.  Indeed the final 'bottom-line' was the net profit.  We also looked at how this was built up, through various levels of contribution. Indeed, PST was the company with the best planning I ever worked for.  I learned more from that than I ever did from any MBA material.

One thing that did amuse me was that the American headquarters announced that the board was retiring to the country to discuss the 'great leap forward' which was their long-range planning exercise.  What was so amusing was that this was taking place in the country in up-state New York; but at the company’s nuclear fallout shelter! 

As one example of dubious management decisions, however this time in terms of the futility of bringing the law into business, Milk of Magnesia was owned (under the PST umbrella), by 'Charles Philips'; as was proudly claimed on the label bottle. However, Philips Eindhoven also wanted to brand their own pharmaceuticals operation under the Philips name. The argument about the copyright had been going on for more than ten years when I arrived. The legal battle had cost hundreds of thousands of pounds, and the lawyers on both sides were still fighting it.  Soon after I arrived, however, the name Charles Philips was removed from the Milk of Magnesia label and the product became an ordinary PST product; but that didn't stop lawyers from fighting on, as the battle continued unabated!

While I remained the assistant brand manager on Delrosa, a new brand manager Bernard Nicholson eventually took over.  Bernard was especially hard nosed, the sort of manager PST loved. He was very friendly with one of the other assistant brand managers and they had boozy evenings together -- again something which is essential in many companies.  I remember Ray, this friend, coming in one morning and asking where had he been the previous evening -- which was a bit worrying as he had been driving!  Not long after that he went on an even worse binge, when even he felt he was not safe to drive.  Unfortunately, on taking the train back home, he fell off the platform and had to be rescued by the station staff before he was run over by the next train. Who says it is more dangerous driving?  I last saw him on television being investigated by one of the watchdog programmes; and threatening the presenter with physical harm!

Anyway Bernard knew the game that was played in PST.  We had a new product that was in test market, called Sparkling Spring.  Essentially it was a fizzy powder based on Andrews Liver Salts, which was PST's main brand, which when put into water fizzed up to produce a fizzy drink. The difference in this case was that the laxative properties were removed and various vitamins were added along with an orange flavour.  You put a spoonful in a glass, added water and it miraculously fizzed up into a lovely orange drink which was good for you.  There were great hopes, for it had sold well into test market, and all the retail audits were showing good results.  Bernard well knew that you made your reputation in PST by launching successful new brands and he was preparing for a massive national launch. 

Unfortunately, just before the launch was due to be finalised, two things happened. One was that the sales nose dived. It turned out that the product was something of a gimmick; women bought the product to see how it worked - and having seen its effect didn't bother to buy it again. Something similar was the fate experienced in the US by equivalent of Signal toothpaste; where people bought the product to see how the stripes were produced -- and never bought again -- whereas in the UK the stripes were used as a means of demonstrating the extra ingredient and the product continued to be successful.  Anyway, whatever the reason, sales of Sparkling Spring were nose diving!

Even worse, though, the product was unstable and actually going mouldy in the jars!  I presented this information to Bernard, which perhaps I should have thought twice about, since Bernard had me moved sideways -- and proceeded to launch the product anyway. He must have known that the cost to PST would be hundreds of thousands of pounds, but he did it anyway.  He was right. He was promoted to marketing manager and the poor guy who came in to take over the brand was fired a few months later when the national sales did nose dive and the product went bad in the jars!

Having been pushed sideways, I moved on to actually become a full brand manager, on some smaller brands. Thus I had Philips toothpaste, which just after the Second World War had been brand leader. But it had long been in decline and was on its last legs. More important I had Milpar.  This was Milk of Magnesia -- the other main brand of PST -- but mixed with paraffin and largely sold through hospitals.  It was, needless to say, a very effective laxative. I did make my mark on this. I changed the pack labels, making them much cleaner. I even tested a TV commercial -- which was one the best I have ever seen. For once the agency ignored my brief, but produced such a good storyboard that I gave the go-ahead anyway. Unfortunately it was only run test market.  I also visited hospitals, which was unusual even for a brand manager.

Matters came to head when, I later learned, I had applied my own job. I was looking around for a job on a more important brand elsewhere, when I applied to a box number.  I never did that again, for it turned that PST was the firm looking for new brand managers -- and it didn't appreciate my own application.  Thus was I fired for the first time in my career!

It was terrible experience. I remember going home and collapsing.  My future was destroyed -- at least I thought it was at the time.  That night I had to sleep in Pat's arms and even though we had single beds at the time.

After being fired by PST, with three months notice (which helped), I was desperate to get a job. With a daughter, and a son on the way, I needed to get a job as soon as possible. So I fired off literally hundreds of applications and replied to job ads for almost as many.  As the weeks dragged on nothing happened.  Then I gradually got through to a few interviews, though these were unsuccessful.  It's my experience that, in job hunting, it takes time to get into the right frame of mind, and to develop the right experiences from which you can learn -- so that you become a good interviewee!

Thus it was, after three months, all of a sudden half a dozen job offers rolled in!

I can only remember two of them in detail. One was as a brand manager for Gallahers and the other was marketing manager at Westons Biscuits.  That at Westons Biscuits was a leap to the next level of management, marketing manager instead of brand manager, so I took it.

Westons Biscuits in those days was part of Garfield Weston's empire, which also included a whole range of bread companies and the supermarket chain Finefare. For some reason he owned two biscuits companies; Westons Biscuits in Slough and Burtons Biscuits in Lancashire.  He also owned the Ryvita brand, of slimming biscuits, which was handled by Burtons Biscuits. 

Westons Biscuits, where I was offered the position of marketing manager, had been around for some time. In the 1950s its main brand had been 'Wagon Wheels' -- which some see as a cultural icon of that period; as was another of its brands, Jammy Dodgers!  They had a range of other products and together these added up to a reasonable turnover.  The managing director was Malcolm Denwood; and he was a nice guy.  But he knew nothing of marketing, hence the reason he wanted a marketing expert -- which was to be me.

It was a pleasant environment and well-paid. I took my car, in the morning, for the company chauffeur to wash it and fill it up with free petrol.  Then, during the morning, the chef brought round a range of meats, usually steaks, so I could choose which one I wanted for lunch -- which I had with Denwood in the directors’ dining room!

I quickly worked myself in, going round with the reps who sold the biscuits into grocery shops. Like most similar fast-moving consumer goods (fmcg) companies in those days, we supplied a range of shop types from supermarkets down to very small corner shops. I fondly remember one corner shop proprietor who, when the salesman pointed out that the pack of biscuits on the shelf was rather old -- it was actually five years old when they shouldn't have been held for more than three months -- said that she realised this and was thinking of reducing the price to get rid of it!

Every morning I used to sit down with Denwood and go through the sales returns.  This was one part of the job I found depressing, since – like many managers at a time when the stick was used much more frequently than the carrot - he was very critical of the salesman who didn't achieve target. He also had very short memory, which I suspect is not unusual in such circumstances, since – even if a salesman had been making excellent sales for five days on the trot but then fell below average for two days - Denwood was already thinking about firing him!  Selling is a very insecure occupation.

I also spent some time going round the factories, the one in Slough where I was based and the one in South Wales which was almost the same.  In both massive road ‘tankers’ carrying flour came into the yard and blew their tons of contents into our silos.  From there the flour, and the other ingredients, were pumped into massive mixers before being rolled into sheet pastry and then stamped out. The stamped biscuits then slowly passed through the long ovens, to tumble out at the end; where they were wrapped into the familiar packets.  I enjoy immersing myself in production technologies - it is the last element of the scientist left in me - and there is something very basic about the whole idea of producing food products.

I had been there for three months when I began to wonder about the future. Garfield Weston was then getting on, and it was fairly obvious that he would soon be handing over to one of his sons -- most likely Galen (as did indeed happen).  When this happened, I reasoned, Galen would look at the various components of the empire and would see that it was totally illogical to have two biscuits companies doing virtually the same job.  Due to the lack of sophistication of senior group management, I also reasoned that, when that happened, Galen would pick whatever management team was doing best at that time – in terms of short-term profit - and fire the other one.

I went to my managing director, Denwood, with these thoughts.  In fact with much more than that, for I had already decided that I had to get out before the cataclysm.  So I prepared a complete marketing plan for him.  This, in essence, said that -- in order to be the best performing board at the time of that the decision -- we had to milk the company and its products.  Thus everything had to be run down.  Our stocks had to be minimised, and our sales maximised by promotion, in order to generate the largest short-term profit -- which was all Galen would notice.  In this scenario marketing was a luxury, and certainly a marketing manager was a luxury too far. On the other hand, I gave him some new products so that he could launch these; and sell them, in a stock loading operation, into the pipeline -- since even if they failed to sell they would make a profit in the short-term.

Having read this Denwood turned round to me and said in amazement “...I can't see you in this, you're writing itself out of the story”.  I said “...yes indeed, the last thing you need is me!”

Thus did I persuade him to let me go, but he gave me three months salary as a leaving present.  It was worthwhile from his point of view, since a year later Garfield Weston did hand over to Galen, and Galen immediately fired the management of Burtons Biscuits. Denwood and his team were put in charge of the merged venture!

It wasn't such a life-threatening decision for me, since I had already signed up for Gallaghers and was sitting at my desk there the following Monday.  The three months salary paid for the deposit on my first house.

For the first couple of years after leaving university we had lived the life of riley. I wasn't earning too much, but Pat was earning more and between us we had plenty of disposable income.  Hence we went out a lot - to the theatre and cinema and ate at reasonable restaurants.  All that changed when Pat became pregnant, although she stayed at Imperial College until her seventh month.

For once Pat was very fashionably dressed.  Immediately opposite FCB was the best maternity wear shop, I think it was called ‘Just Jane’, and with her maternity clothes from there Pat was surprisingly elegant.

By this time I had moved to PST, and was working in the field force as part of my training. Accordingly, I was able to take Pat around with me while I visited the various chemist shops on my round.

When the time came for the birth, however, it was a nightmare. Pat was in labour for something like 36 hours, and for most of the first 24 hours I was with her expecting the baby to arrive any minute. After that I was so tired I had to go home. When Sarah did arrive, eventually needing a forceps delivery, and she was handed to me - in those days husbands did not see the birth - I was appalled by the bloody mess I beheld. I know all babies are supposed to look lovely but there are limits.

She was christened up at my parents' place in the Wirral, in Bromborough church. The godparents were our library friend Judith and my cousin Ian. Judith kept up with Sarah until she was in her teens, giving her birthday and Christmas presents, but Ian took no interest whatsoever (as did most godparents even in those days!).

We bought Sarah all the best, and latest, toys; all of which were supposed to improve a child's intelligence. In particular, we had the 'Teach Your Baby to Read' set. This contained large print words, up to six inches high, which you were supposed to show the baby and then speak the word -- even before they spoke themselves. It was supposed to work wonders, and maybe it ultimately did, but Sarah never learned to read this way!  We were, thus, typical middle-class parents of the time – and since - desperate to give our children the best start in in life.

Sarah started out in a carry cot in our bedroom, but she soon became too big for that and moved down to a proper cot in the dining room. By then she had become something of a problem - in terms of getting her to sleep at night - it often took a couple of hours to stop her screaming. The parents among you will recognise how disruptive this could be.

During the day she was fine, albeit that she constantly sicked up her food. Even so, she soon started to crawl and then walk up and down the hall holding on to a baby walker. She finally walked by herself on a sunny day in Richmond Park where we used to go for picnics.

Two years later Miles arrived. The second baby is almost always easier, and by then Sarah was climbing up the stairs to be looked after by the wife of the couple upstairs and her children. Miles was also born at Westminster hospital. This time however I took Pat and saw her into the ward and then immediately went home to sleep, confident that nothing would happen for at least a day. In fact when I went in the following morning Miles had already been born; in the middle of the night!

The second half of the 1960s started with what was probably the best job I ever had, albeit this was with a company which would now typically be seen as a mass murderer. This was also one of the best times in my private life.

When I was fired by PST, one of the choices eventually on offer to me was as a brand manager at Gallahers.  In the event I chose to go to Weston Biscuits, since this was a marketing manager job which I thought would be better for my career.  However when, three months later, I realised the future in this was limited, I approached Gallahers again. Fortunately, the brand manager's job there was still open -- and they still very much wanted me.  This turned out to be just about the best job I ever had. Certainly it was the most enjoyable one.

That may sound silly, since people now look askance at you if are working in the tobacco industry; but in those days it was one of the old established, and highly respected, industries.  We were only just starting to get a backlash from lung cancer.

Gallahers was the second largest tobacco manufacturer in United Kingdom.  The largest was Imperial Tobacco, and the third was Rothmanns -- the South African corporation's UK offshoot. Gallahers covered the whole range of tobacco products.  Obviously it had a wide range of cigarettes, but it also had cigars and pipe tobaccos.  Pipe tobacco was the area where I was due to work. 

First of all, a little background about the cigarette market; since that dominated all the tobacco manufacturers' sales.  Sometime previously, after the Second World War,  Gallahers Senior Service had been the biggest brand on the market, but when filters were applied to cigarettes in general the brand pattern changed -- as it also did over subsequent years, as market requirements changed. 

At the time I went to Gallahers the leading brand was Imperial Tobacco’s ‘Embassy’.  Paradoxically, I had seen the launch of this -- from a distance -- when I was in the advertising agency.  At that time Gallahers had just bought up a very small manufacturer called Wix.  This was unique in that its cigarettes were different to other cigarette brands; in as much as they gave coupons which could be exchanged for gifts.  I later learned the Gallahers didn't take this brand seriously and really only bought it for the roll-your-own tobacco side, but Imperial Tobacco didn't realise this that the time.  So, as a spoiling campaign, they launched their own Embassy brand with gift certificates.  At first they put little effort into this, but then - as it became increasingly successful - they promoted it heavily and it swept the board. Anyway, at the time I joined Gallahers the cigarette market was dominated by coupon brands -- and even Gallahers had a massive warehouse near Heathrow which was full of gifts they were shipping to customers!

Also at that time the main Gallahers’ brand was Benson & Hedges, a quite upmarket brand.  This later came to be the brand leader overall, when the rules for paying duty on the tobacco changed -- and duty became based on the purchase price.  It changed even further later on when cancer scares persuaded people to take low tar cigarettes, where the tar level was determined by the filter, and Benson & Hedges Silk Cut became the brand of choice.

As I said, I went into the pipe tobacco marketing group.  At that time this consisted of Roland Bligh, who was the marketing manager, and Brian Harri, who was to become my brand assistant. Roland was a lovely guy, one of the best managers I ever worked for.  Brian also was a nice guy, but was less interested in marketing -- and eventually went off to work as a salesman elsewhere. The brands we managed included Old Holborn, in the roll-your-own sector, which was the biggest brand of the group. On the pipe tobacco side, which became my main interest, the leading brand was Condor --  a downmarket, strong-smoking pipe tobacco.  We also had a range of other luxury tobaccos including John Cotton, which was a mixture, and Escudo, a Navy Cut.

The first thing Roland did was to set out a training programme which, give him his due, was an excellent one.  As the first part of this I once more went out with a sales force, much as I had at PST, though this time selling to tobacconists.  Fortunately this time it was for days not months!

The main difference in the sales operation was that Gallahers’ sales people were provided with a computer printout of all brands stocked by each CTN (Confectioner, Tobacconist, Newsagent – the small retailers who dominated sales of cigarettes in those days), together with the sales they had made.  This was leading edge, where computers were then a rarity, but in this way the salesman had a good idea what was needed -- and was able to give expert advice to the shopkeeper.  All this was handled by the Honeywell computer complex at the main finished goods warehouse near Heathrow. 

I also went out with their merchandisers, again very much the same as those in PST - except that the hats they had only recently stopped wearing had been bowlers!

Roland really went to town on my training, and I remember especially well my visit to the Northeast, to go out with the salesmen there.  While there Roland also arranged for me to go down a pit, since our roll tobacco included chewing tobacco -- mainly sold to miners. The problem down a pit is that the dust is so prevalent that chewing gum, used to keep your mouth moist, was tasteless. Almost nothing can be tasted above the coal dust -- but – fortunately for us - chewing tobacco remained tasty!  I later tried out chewing tobacco, but only once.  I chewed it and found it was tasteless, and then - in terms of the vernacular - the juice came out. My mouth and throat were literally paralysed. I rushed around the office desperately trying to find a spitoon, a wastepaper basket, but my throat was so paralysed that I couldn't speak for the next three hours.

Going down the mine was quite an experience, but one which was in many respects a symbol of the period – when mining was still one of the largest employers. Now, of course, at least in terms of deep mines it has disappeared off the map.  The mine I went down was very deep, on the coast and, having descended several hundred of feet, we walked over seven miles - out under the sea - eventually stooping lower and lower as the roof of the main drive sank under the weight of the earth.  When we got to the seams themselves they were only 18 inches high.  There we had to crawl on our hands and knees to the coalface itself.  While lying there, watching the miners working in seams just 18 inches high, and having to shovel 12 tonnes of coal every shift even though they had mechanical cutters, you could hear the roof falling down behind you.  As the props were moved forward the roof was allowed to fall to fill the gap. It was an eerie sensation -- especially when the guide told us about the time, few weeks before, when he had been trapped for a number of hours by a rockfall!

When I arrived at Gallahers it was very old-fashioned firm.  It was dominated not by production people but by the leaf buying people.  In this respect it was rather like the wine industry.  It was a connoisseur's trade -- even though the product was smoked by the average man.  Indeed, the company was dominated by the families who had been running it for generations.  In particular my boss' boss, John Mason, was universally known as Master John; since he'd been the son of a previous main board director.

Anyway, I had to learn about leaf buying as part of my introduction to the company.  It was, even in the modern age, very important to the tobacco industry.  Thus I learned all about the different parts of the tobacco plants, which produced different tobaccos; cutter leaves – at the top of the plant, I think - were particularly important in the production of cigarettes.  I also had to learn all the areas where tobacco came from.  Traditionally they came from America, from Virginia.  At the time I was there, though, most of the supplies came from Rhodesia (this was before UDI). On the pipe tobacco side we also bought a range of specialist tobaccos.  Latakia - which was cured by woodsmoke until it was black and smelled heavily of the woodsmoke - came from Greece, Perique came from the Louisiana - where it had been buried in the mud for years so that it fermented.  In particular, for the most popular pipe tobacco brands, we used a lot of the fire dried tobacco -- from Rhodesia -- which was especially strong.

Thus, it was not just a matter of being able to name the main tobaccos in a blend, you also had to be able to recognise where they came from.  As with wine connoisseurship, you had to be able to take a leaf, look at it and say where it came from and from what part of the plant; and even the year it was grown.  This sounds impossible, but it was a skill which we eventually learned.  After six months or so I could do this. I amazed one tobacco dealer, in Brumfits, when I took one of their own mixtures and was able to identify - even from the finely shredded tobacco - not merely where it had  come from but what the year was!  This, in the old days, was what set you apart as a leader in the tobacco industry.

The tobacco was brought into the UK in vast quantities and was stored in bonded warehouses. In these warehouses it was typically stored in 400 pound bales or boxes.  It was only when the tobacco was withdrawn from these warehouses, to go into production, that duty was paid on the raw weight of the tobacco.  To a degree, this depended upon the moisture content.  Thus you paid a penalty, in effect, for warehousing around the docks, since the moisture content tended to be higher.  I couldn't understand, therefore, when the main leaf for Condor was stored in such a warehouse.  I was, however, discreetly told that the reason for this was that, when the tobacco was weighed, there were two people separately reporting the weight -- one for Gallahers and one for customs.  In this particular warehouse the customs man always rounded down, never averaging.  As a result the amount of money saved in this way -- which customs didn't realise was happening -- was worth more than the extra moisture!

Indeed the finances of duty were critical to the company.  Every day when the Gallahers courier went to the customs -- with a cheque for a hundred million pounds or so -- he would arrive there just after three o'clock; formally apologising for his lateness. The reason for this was that the banks closed their books at three o'clock and hence the cheque would not be cleared until the following day. This by itself gave Gallahers extra interest of several million pounds a year.  Mind you, this was nothing compared with what happened one day while I was the Gallahers.  One of our managers was used going out to lunch with a friend of his at the Bank of England.  That day the friend telephoned through to say he couldn't make lunch and let slip that they were working out the implications of devaluation!  Gallahers was one of the few companies which could do anything about this, since at that the time transfer of sterling was regulated but Gallahers had literally billions which it could move instantly abroad -- since this was required for buying leaf.  Gallahers immediately did this, and made £600 million when the pound was devalued!  It was never clear to me whether this was an accidental slip, or a favour to a friend.

Before moving on to pipe tobaccos, which were to be my responsibility, I should perhaps explain the production of cigarettes, since they were staple diet of Gallahers’ business.

Having been withdrawn from the high security bonded warehouse, where it was held before duty had been paid on it, the tobacco for cigarettes was first of all blended.  Originally this had been done by hand -- workers with garden forks turning it over.  It had eventually become much more mechanised, though, and the tobacco was then (in the 1960s) run backwards and forwards over silos so that a layer of one type of tobacco lay on top of another one.  Then the end the silo was opened and a 'blended' cross-section of the tobacco fell onto a conveyor; so all the leaf was thoroughly mixed. Next the tobacco was pulled through cutters which cut it into rag -- the very fine tobacco that you find in your cigarettes. It was then passed to Molins cigarette making machines. These wrapped the cigarette paper around the outside and inserted the filters into what was then called Rod and these were then cut out as cigarettes.  The cigarettes were ultimately pushed into the cigarette packet. 

All this happened, though, to millions and millions of cigarettes every day. Everything worked at the speed of light.

At last we come to pipe tobacco and roll-your-own. Roll-your-own tobacco was turned into rag in very much the same way as had been that for cigarette making.  It was, however, made of much stronger -- and hence cheaper -- tobacco. When I arrived roll your own tobacco was made in Clerkenwell at the Wix tobacco factory.  Gallahers had bought this some years before, along with Kensitas, but it was Old Holborn they really wanted.  They made a killing with it in fact, since the whole company only cost something like a quarter of a million; since it previously had not been very profitable.  Gallahers changed the profitability, overnight, by one move.  They put in electronic weighing, albeit that it was partially hand fed.  Thus gangs of girls used to sit in front of weighing machines, putting the rag into the weighing scales as they came before them - they weighed in an ounce or whatever the size was required - and this was electronically measured. The girls were very accurate, since if it was not accurately weighed it was rejected.  It had to be hand weighed since the girls had to separate the strands of tobacco to get exactly the right weight.  Having, after a few seconds, got the weight right the cups then moved on to deposit it into the packing machine which packed it into a soft wrap pack.  This, by itself, improved profitability by several hundred percent -- previously weighing hade been very approximate. 

In any case, on getting into Wix, Gallahers discovered that they had an large tobacco library, covering a number of back years, without any obvious use.  Simply by putting this in for duty drawback, that is passing it back to customs and getting the duty back on it, they more than recovered the £250,000 that was the cost of the purchase of the whole of the old company. 

In my time there this factory was moved to Lisnafillan near Ballymena in Northern Ireland.  This was a massive job since all the equipment had to be relocated. For weeks there were lorries trundling backwards and forwards carrying massive pieces of production equipment between the two locations.  Paradoxically, though, what we had not thought about proved to be the biggest problem in the move. This was of the tobacco stocks held in warehouses. These could be in delivered by just one, very large, boat -- but in practice it had to the delivered on several dozen smaller ships since the insurers would not accept the risk of having several billion pounds worth of tobacco on one ‘bottom’ (ship)!

Although the processes used in the production of Gallahers pipe tobaccos came from earlier times, and looked crude, they were probably the most skilled of all the manufacturing operations within Gallahers.  Production was carried out in Gallahers’ York Street factory in Belfast, which was an old multi-storey building.  In the case of many of the pipe tobaccos - which involved very small production runs - the tobacco was mixed by hand, literally on the floor.  Thereafter a range of techniques was used. Mixtures, for example, were made in exactly the same way as rag was for cigarettes, though the strands were much thicker.  They tended to include heavily fired (smoked) tobacco, especially Latakia which was very strong indeed.  They were then weighed by hand and put into tins which were vacuum sealed. 

The main difference in production of the major brands, though, was that these big selling tobaccos were ‘pressed’.  Thus they were cut coarsely and made up into a slab, with whole leaves at top and bottom to provide a binder which held the block together when it was sliced. They were then put into a press which applied pressure and heat. What came out was a solid block of material.  This was sliced into very thin slices and -- for the more expensive products -- once more put into vacuum sealed tins.  For our big sellers, especially Condor, the slices were hand packed in foil and put in cardboard boxes.

Another difference in their formulation, from those used in cigarettes, was that the tobacco was heavily flavoured. In those days coumarin was used as the main ingredient of this flavour -- though we had change this when it was found to be especially carcinogenic!  This was, though, less of a problem than that for another manufacturer for, when it modernised its factory, it found the flavour had changed. After much research they found that the problem was the new toilets they had provided - for the first time - for their workers. Previously the workers had urinated against the outside wall, and this - leaking through the brickwork to the blending floor behind - was what had given the unique flavour!

Cigarettes, on the other hand, had no additions -- despite what the public thought -- the only exception being Park Drive which sold in the northern part of Britain, where water soluble flavouring was put in.  Indeed, by the time I left, the cigarettes all used exactly the same blend. The difference between the different brands was made by the filters that we used!

Our main pipe tobacco brand, Condor, was made from cheap tobacco, and hence was very strong -- but that was what its smokers wanted.  Over time, though, we lightened the blend so it appealed to a wider group of smokers.  This was achieved partly by using a lighter blend of tobacco -- essentially containing less fired tobacco -- and also not pressing for as long; all of which also helped to reduce the cost. 

I was fascinated by the production processes, as I always have been, and visited the factories regularly.  Ultimately, in any case, our group was responsible for production as well as marketing. This was the specific responsibility of Roy Ingram, who was from Rhodesia and previously had been a tobacco farmer.  He was a lovely guy, with whom I was very friendly.  On the other hand, I couldn't persuade him that his man management methods were unsuitable for modern times.  He believed, quite literally, that the only way to get his black workers to work harder was to wander around the fields carrying a bullwhip and using it!  Even so, I liked Roy a lot and was sorry when he went back to Rhodesia  - after UDI – to sell their tobacco crop. I suspect he probably became a millionaire as a result!

We were always trying new blends, and I was constantly having pipe tobacco put in front of me which the blenders thought was better.  By that stage I had taken up tobacco smoking, as a necessity for the job -- though it took me some time to get to it and I was very sick the first time I tried it.  Anyway, I used to have two blends I smoked myself. One was an export blend. It was very expensive and was not available in the United Kingdom. The other was my ideal. I simply asked the blenders in the laboratory to produce the best possible tobacco regardless of cost.  They did this, spending several thousand pounds in the process -- since it had to be produced as a full 14 lb cake of the product. This was the one I carried around with me.  It was a delight to go to the Pipeman of the Year lunch and offer this around to my competitors.  They all recognised the quality and said “...where can I buy this”, only to have me say “...sorry it is my own private blend”!

As you will gather, as part of my job as brand manager, I had to be able to understand all these processes, which I found not just a challenge of the job but actually rather intellectually fulfilling!

A few months after I joined, Gallahers suddenly lurched from being very old-fashioned to being quite avant-garde -- at least in terms of marketing.  All of a sudden the management, or the operational management, of the company was put in hand in the hands of the marketing groups.  And these became the most powerful marketing groups I ever worked for. 

There were then three divisions. As you might expect, Cigarette Division was the biggest and dominated Gallahers’ business. In addition, though, there was also the Cigar Division and the Tobacco Division -- in which I was located.  Accordingly, we moved from our isolated position, in a suite of offices across Cannon Street, into the main headquarters. This was quite small, even before the vogue for small HQs. We -- in the Tobacco Division -- were lucky in that we were given offices around the back; which were less prestigious but which were again somewhat secluded - and this helped to develop a spirit within the group.  In the group there was still Roland Bligh and myself.  Brian Harri had gone by this time, but we had recruited another brand manager alongside me -- Richard Barrett and then a new-brands manager Hugh MacNiven.  The group, headed up now by the new general manager – John Elliott, was completed with our shared secretary, and of course Roy Ingram who was our liaison with the tobacco production facilities.

The likely carcinogenic nature of cigarettes was well known even then, I had scandalised my GP when I went for my medical to join Gallahers; in that I answered the usual question as to whether I smoked by “... no but I'm starting on Monday”. This was true, because that was when I was joining Gallahers and I felt I had to try the product!  But all this was forgotten when I worked in the exciting world of Gallahers.  Indeed, moving into the new divisional structure, I entered on the just about most fulfilling part of my commercial life. In part this was due to the new general manager, John Elliott, who had also joined this new group.  John was undoubtedly the best manager I have ever worked for.  He was the fairest and most inspiring.  When Richard joined my salary, was £1,750 per annum. Shortly after he had joined I got into taxi with John Elliott. On the way to the advertising agency, John leaned over to me and said “I think will be unfair if you're not at the same salary as Richard so I'm increasing your salary to £2,500”!  That was just about the largest jump in salary I have ever had come to me -- and the reasoning behind it was why John was such a good manager.

One story about John will, I think, indicate his style of management. He had been general manager of the Northern group of factories in Gallahers.  This was a group of factories located, around Manchester, in very old multi-storey buildings which were no longer suitable for cigarette making.  As a result Gallahers had to move out from these. The development grant system was such, in those days, that Gallahers had no choice -- in financial terms -- but to move to Northern Ireland. Accordingly these factories had to be shut down, which meant getting rid of several thousand workers.  Under John Elliott the terms and conditions of the redundancies were very generous and everyone was very happy.  Indeed so well-respected was John Elliott that, even though he had made them all redundant, the workers clubbed together and bought him a television set when the factories finally shut down.

The nub of this story however was that, at one stage during the run down to closure, John called in the shop steward and explained to him that things had been going far too smoothly. The workers, though they there were happy with what was happening, thought that the shop steward was too close to management and wasn't doing his best for them.  The answer that John Elliott proposed was that the shop steward should call a strike.  Thus shop steward went ranting out of John's office and called the strike unless a list of demands was met -- the demands had been provided by John Elliott (they were not significant demands and could be met easily).  John Elliott then seemingly caved in and everything went smoothly again.

From another direction, John frequently used to come down the corridor and sit on my desk, and talk about what was going on.  This was very interesting, I learned a lot from him in this way. One day, however, I said to him “John haven't you got work of your own to get on with”. At which point John explained to me “I delegate as much as I can, because the other alternative is you won't have work to keep you busy; and will be bored like me!” It was a good lesson in man management.

The group of us worked very well together, where everyone was somewhat of a character.  As I have said John Elliott was the most interesting character of all.  He was an old Etonian, and his sons were going to Eton. He pointed out, however, that it was the most egalitarian comprehensive of all -- since there were no intellectual tests to get there.  As I pointed out to him, however, there was the little matter of money!

Richard was also an interesting character in a different way.  He aspired to same things as John Elliott, and had put his son down for Eton very soon as he was born.  He lived in a big old house in Henley.  Richard was not uncomfortable in the milieu. Having been at Oxford, in the boat crew, he also rowed for England in the 1960 Olympic Games located in Rome.  He was a member of the Henley stewards. I well remember him wondering whether he should take the day off, because he and the other stewards were having a private lunch with Prince Philip!  His wife was also well-placed. They had tickets to the royal enclosure at Ascot -- which is a very restricted privilege.

But above all, though, I remember him for an outing he took with Hugh McNiven; the new-brands manager.  They were standing on Bank tube station when Hugh nudged Richard in the ribs and said “There is Mary Rand”. She was the famous athlete of the times, and she was down at the other of the platform. Just then she turned around and came running along the platform throwing her arms around Richard's neck and kissing him passionately. It turned out he had been a room mate with Sid Rand, then her husband, at the Olympics!

Hugh MacNiven didn't have quite the same track record, but he was the first Scots nationalist I had met.  His wife worked for Schwarzkopf -- the hair colour people. She told a lovely story about them taking over a competitor in the hair colourant market.  This competitor had been making inroads because it seemed to be able to bleach women’s hair far more powerfully than any of their own products, which is what customers wanted.  Having taken over the Company they found that the reason for this was simply that the strength of bleach, which would normally have caused the head to hurt, was countered by a local anaesthetic in the product.  Needless to say, as a reputable company, they had to stop doing this.

One of events I was privileged to take part in, while at Gallahers, was an invitation to visit the ATV television studios in Shepperton.  This was intended to be for the general managers, but both my general manager and Roland were engaged elsewhere; so the perk was passed on to me.  We went by chauffeur driven car rather than by taxi, though with three of us in back it was very cramped, and much less than the perk I had expected.

Never mind, when we got to ATV we were shown around the television studios which was fascinating for me. In particular I was bowled over by one of my favourite singers practising her show. She was just on seated on a stool with only a pianist for company.  In this improvised setting, she sang even better than I ever heard her do on television.

The real reason for being there, though, was to show us the first experiments in colour television.  They only had a small studio set up, with a single television camera.  We took it in turns to appear before the camera and to watch the end result in the next room. When my turn came I put on my usual style, only to hear roars of laughter coming from next door.  The general manager of ATV commented that he would be happy to engage me as a presenter anytime!  Thus a television career almost began.

We had lunch on their barge moored on the Thames next to the studio. It was, needless to say, an excellent lunch. The talk over lunch was, however, the most fascinating thing of all.  Clearly we spent some time talking about the future of television, but I can't remember any of this. The one thing I do remember was their discussion about Tony Hancock. The comedian was then in the middle of his last series with ATV, before he went off to Australia and committed suicide.  The management were very open about the fact that they had just decided to get rid of him because of his alcoholism; though nobody, not even Hancock, knew about this at the time!  They had terrible problems even getting him into studio, and then getting him into an acceptable state to record the show. It was a tragic story.

It was at Gallahers that I had my first real chance to apply my marketing skills, and in particular my skills in market research, on the grand scale.  We had a separate market research department. It was a very professional department and I got on very well with its management.  To start off, though, I didn't need to use them that much -- or at least that's what I thought.  I had market research reports coming out of my ears. All of them said exactly the same thing. Pipe tobaccos, and in particular Condor, were declining at an absolutely steady 1% per annum.  This literally was as pipe smokers died off, and there was nothing we could do about it!  Our job in marketing, therefore, was to maximise the profits that we get out of this situation.  Accordingly, I first of all addressed myself to the roll and twist market.  This was a market that really was declining fast as its aging users died.  I therefore increased price, since these users had nowhere else to go.  I felt uncomfortable about this, since they were old age pensioners, but it was easiest way of starting to leverage profits up – and firms are driven by profits – and, as I, say they had nowhere else to go.

On the main brands I also managed to leverage up the price.  This was because, once a quarter, I met with my competitors from Ogden's, Imperial Tobacco division which owned the St. Bruno brand -- the brand leader and our main competitor, and the representative of Rothmanns, who owned Erinmore, the third brand in market.  Ostensibly we were engaged on joint PR activities across the pipe tobacco market -- especially the ‘Pipeman of the Year’ award.  In reality our main benefit was approached discreetly over lunch, when one or other of us would say '... I think it's my turn to increase prices and I intend to do that in the near future'.  In those days this was strictly not illegal, since we didn't agree prices as a cartel, and increased our prices individually. On the other hand, we did this knowing full well that the others would follow suit. It is now very illegal.

In this way the prices were rapidly escalated -- until the tobacco division became one of the main profit centres of Gallahers.

On the basis of the extensive market research, I was sure that there was nothing I could do about increasing sales.  At this time, however, the cigarette people were planning on running a continuing panel to see how their smokers changed their brands.  They wanted us to join them to make the data more complete.  I refused, on the grounds that it was a waste of money.  We knew that pipe smokers, especially Condor smokers, never changed brands -- they were just about the most loyal customers anyone ever had. Anyway, to cut long story short, the cigarette marketers said they would add us to the survey for free -- so we let them get on with it.  When the results came in, however, they showed that pipe smokers, or at least a third of them, actually changed their brands every three months!  This was a complete revelation. All the data said it could never happen. Accordingly I went back to look at the previous surveys and, in the light of the new material, it quickly became obvious that the earlier questionnaires had been loaded to deliver the answers that were expected.

Accordingly we had we do all of our market research again, at a cost of several hundred thousand pounds -- a massive cost in those days.

The market research manager, who I got on very well with, was keen to do some very avant-garde work -- using techniques which were only just being developed.  In particular he wanted us to use factor and cluster analysis.  These were only just emerging because they demanded the use of computing power, which had only recently become available. As well as representing the most sophisticated research which was available to commercial firms, they were also very expensive procedures.  Factor analysis looked at what aspects of the product were important to the consumer.  To do this we used Kelly Grids, something that had rarely been used before.  This, in particular, ended with significant use computers -- you can read about it in my marketing book. Indeed the market research I did in those days was the foundation of my later career as an academic!  Cluster analysis then went further to see what groups of customers were important to the brand, and again computer analysis was essential.

The most fascinating results came from the factor analysis.  Thus, for example, we found that the perceived strength of the brand was not based on the actual smoking strength but on the colour of the pack! The darker the colour on the pack the stronger the brand was seen to be.  Accordingly, as part of our move towards a wider coverage of pipe smokers in general, we lightened the brown colour of the pack, whilst making it warmer and replaced the yellow colour printing with gold printing -- since this was associated with quality.  While saving money from the overall course of our actions, since we were able to use cheaper leaf, our quality image went up dramatically. 

In terms of cluster analysis, the key result was that Saint Bruno and Condor were almost equidistant on either side of the ideal position in the marketplace.  Thus, I made the best strategic move I ever did.  I didn't move Condor to the ideal spot, but jumped over into the position between St. Bruno and the ideal -- capturing an even bigger share of the market. Tony Blair later used exactly the same strategy to destroy the Conservative Party. In the case of Condor this was achieved by the changes in the product and package and in particular by very carefully designed advertising.

The net result of this was that we had a unique understanding of the marketplace -- which none of our competitors had

As part of the process, I also built a mathematical (econometric) model of the marketplace.  This was done largely by hand, using one of the first electronic calculators.  It was typewriter size machine which only had the arithmetical functions you can now get built into watch, but it cost £500 and I had a lot of explaining to get hold of it.  But it was worth its weight in gold in use, since it speeded up my calculations enormously. With it I was able to build a matrix structure which looked at all factors which affected the brand.  I was very fortunate in terms of the conditions in the marketplace, which is why I was able to do this. Except for the car market, nobody else has ever been able to reproduce this level of work. 

Thus, we had exact sales figures for every brand. This was because all the tobacco firms were exchanging information at the time, for a court case on resale price maintenance.  This meant we knew what everyone sold, down to the last unit, rather than working to an approximation from retail audits.  In addition, in the marketplace, each brand had made only one very different change in direction each year. Thus, I was able to look at the market each year and see what happened when someone changed their advertising, or reduced price or whatever.  On the basis of this I was able to predict exactly what the result would be of our own planned changes in marketing strategy.

The best measure of the success of this model actually came with Old Holborn rather than Condor.  Thus, looking at the monthly sales figures for this, I announced that they could not be right -- Old Holborn was deviating too far from my prediction. As the deviation was less than 1 percent everyone thought I was mad, but I was convinced that my model was accurate to well below 1 percent; a unique achievement. I insisted on an investigation and it was found that a wholesaler had been given credit of a hundred thousand pounds instead of one hundred and, and was quietly spending this.  My image was enhanced considerably by this achievement!

On the other hand, my greatest marketing achievement at Galahers, and indeed in my whole career, was to move Condor from No 2 in the pipe tobacco market to become the brand leader.  This was a major achievement in a marketplace which was supposed to be dying. As we have seen, our newly gained information had – surprisingly - showed that this was achievable.  Accordingly, I made a presentation to the main board, the main gist of which was that we should double our advertising from one million a year to two millions a year.  At the same time we would be changing our packaging, product and promotions, as well as the creative message. All this, though, was based on the marketing research we had done. It was a classical marketing campaign; everything based on research.

Accordingly, because it was a big investment we did the conventional thing and put it into television test market; in the Tyne Tees Television area in north-east England.  We sat back and waited for the results. To our horror, the results showed sales actually went down!  We later found out that the north-east was leading the country into a recession, and this was the reason.  But it was scarcely a story that I should have found comfortable presenting to the board.  Accordingly I had to come before the board and explain myself!

I used my econometric model to explain what should have happened, and what didn't happen.  I was quite convincing -- as I really did know what I was talking about.  But I suspect that I may have been helped by the atmosphere, which distracted them.  It was the first time I used an overhead projector and I proceeded to actually write on the screen with my magic marker rather than on the acetate.  They found it so funny, almost falling off their chairs, that they forgot about the main issue and agreed that we could go national anyway.  Even so, I like to think that they were a very brave board. And at the time they were, because it when they were pushing Gallahers from an old-fashioned firm to be at the very leading edge of marketing. In any case, fortunately when we did launch the campaign nationally, the expected results were achieved.  Thus Condor, instead of declining one per cent every year, increased at ten per cent per annum and soon became the brand leader -- to the great surprise of Imperial Tobacco.

It also had another hidden effect. The York Street factory was renowned as having the worst labour relations in the company.  When you went across to talk to the workers they used to tell you about the time, in the 1930s, when Gallahers had laid off the whole workforce a week before Christmas and then hired them again after Christmas; simply so they could avoid paying the Christmas bonus.  This was so long before that there couldn't have been any worker in the company who had actually been around at the time, but it was one of those myths which is so ingrained that it defines the culture of the organisation.  In fact it proved very easy to dispel this, though I didn't realise at the time. For, when I went back to the factory after Condor started selling 10 percent more each year, it was smiling faces all round. Labour relations had changed overnight. It turned out that the real reason for them being miserable previously was that they could only see the brand declining and were waiting for the whole operation to be shut down and they to be made redundant!  Now, all of a sudden, they had a future and were enjoying it.

With our success being recognised by senior management, we moved into top gear as a marketing group.  In particular we started to look for a new brand extension to move Condor even more into the main market.  We developed the concept of Condor Mild, which was exactly where we wanted position the new brand. But this was thought to be too adventurous, risking the Condor name, and senior management were not quite so brave in this instance. So, instead, we developed and launched Condor Ready Rubbed. The ready rubbed version of a pipe tobacco was literally ready to put in the pipe. With the flake version the pipe smoker took the individual flake and rubbed it in the palms of his hand to loosen strands so he could then pack these into the bowl of the pipe. In the case of ready rubbed this was already done for him by machinery. The important fact though was not that ready rubbed was easy-to-use but that -- quite illogically -- it was actually seen to be a milder tobacco.  This, combined with changes of pack design and the actual product change, enabled us to move the Condor brand even further into St. Bruno territory.  As, in particular, the pack was green not brown - supposedly to differentiate the ready rubbed version so smokers didn't make a mistake - this gave a much softer image.

Perhaps the most fun part of my job at Gallahers was the advertising.  Certainly, at Gallahers, I had much better control over this, and for once had a happy relationship with the agencies we worked with.  My main agency, Hobson Bates not far away from Euston station, was very much my type of agency.  They understood the marketing objectives, and worked with us to obtain the desired result.  Above all, they did not adopt wild creative ideas which they wanted to push at the expense of the brand.

We used to visit them once a week, driving across to their offices. Roland always came in his own car, and there was usually a race to see who could get there first. When we got there, despite the fact that we were all on the same wavelength, they used sometimes to force the decisions almost to a vote - even though we were the client!  Accordingly some times we found ourselves taking the whole of our own department so we could ‘outvote’ the agency! Even so it was great fun.

As was normal in those days we used to arrive about eleven o'clock and start the meeting, before we went to a lunch to a restaurant nearby. These lunches were excellent, since it was then the agency's traditional way of keeping client personnel happy. We used mainly to go to a restaurant called the Au Savarin, in Charlotte Street. This was a restaurant with a French Greek menu, and was one of the best in London.  As we were regular visitors everyone got to know us.  But, in any case, Roland’s choice was enough to set us apart.  Eventually, after some months, this was too much for the head waiter, who came across to Roland and said “I know what you want. It’s steak with chips and fried onion rings. Why do you do this? The chef hates you. Kindly ask for some decent French or Greek food.  I daren't go back to tell the chef what you want.”  As he was pronouncing this, in a steadily rising voice, the whole of the restaurant turned to look at us.  Give Roland his due, he immediately said “What I want is steak, chips and fried onion rings”!  We never heard another complaint from them.

We did occasionally have a buffet lunch in the agency itself.  I particularly remember we had one where the lunch was to be served in the other half of the conference room to that where the Nielsen people were making their presentation. The charts for the presentation divided the room, whilst the secretaries got on with preparing lunch behind these. It was at a time when very short skirts had just come in. Accordingly, what we could see - underneath the flipcharts - was just the bottom of the girls as they bent over to lay out the lunch. It was a delightful cabaret of various knickers and pert bottoms.  I don't think the speaker ever quite realised why our attention was riveted elsewhere!

Despite our distractions, we came out with some very good advertising; to match our objectives.  The requirement was to highlight the fact that the pipe smoker took his tobacco -- Condor -- so seriously because he was a perfectionist in all things.  We had originally designed storyboards which showed the Condor smoker sitting on an easy chair apparently listening to a hi-fi; but, as the camera drew back, it showed that in fact in his living room he had a whole symphony orchestra.  Another version was to show a normal semidetached house with the pipe smoker again sitting -- this time on a deckchair - in the back garden, but which opened up to show the back garden was actually the gardens at Versailles.  The one I liked best was due to air before fireworks night. In this, where others were setting off normal fireworks, the Condor smoker sent up an Atlas space rocket. In the event we never did do these commercials, since they would have been too expensive, but in any case they were unnecessary.  The simple picture of the smoker immersed in his Condor was quite sufficient.  The byline, which became one of the most famous in advertising, and was still in use several decades afterwards, was 'Its that Condor moment!' 

Indeed, I thoroughly enjoyed making commercials at Gallahers.  Or at least that it is watching commercials being made, and adding the odd ‘creative’ comment myself.  Of course the producer was hired by the agency, and its own television people controlled him directly.

Before we found out that Condor smokers were not as conservative we thought, we made one commercial with a leading actor who was also a well-known pipe-smoker.  All he did, and all we thought we could show him doing, was enjoy a pipe full of tobacco.  It was the first time I used a professional actor and he was a joy to direct.

After that we realised we had to be much more aggressive and much more proactive about expanding our marketplace.  Accordingly we went for the theme that the pipe smoker was very discriminating. As I have said, this later transposed into the famous line 'Ah Condor' and then  -- after my time --  'The Condor Moment'.  This theme lasted for literally decades afterwards, and it became one of the longest lasting advertising campaigns ever!

The first commercial demonstrated this by showing a wrestling match in which one of the contestants was thrown out of the ring. He landed on the audience. All the while, though, the Condor pipe smoker carried on smoking without even noticing what was happening next to him.

The first, major, problem was the scene when we arrived early in the morning. The producers had carried out a recce at night and had chosen Walthamstow baths - where wrestling matches were regularly held – as the ideal location. Unfortunately they had not noticed that it had a glass roof.  As we were shooting in daylight, this was a problem since the shot was supposed to show a darkened hall where the night-time wrestling match was taking place.  It looked as if we would have to cancel the shoot, until I saw the director discreetly negotiating with the scaffolders from the adjoining building site.  Within a few minutes the scaffolders were on strike and were crawling all over the glass roof of the baths covering it with tarpaulins from the building site.  Within half an hour we were inside, in suitable darkness, ready for the shoot.

The wrestler, when he flew out of the ring, was caught by a row of stunt people - with a young girl immediately underneath the falling wrestler.  Their chairs had been partially sawn through, so they suddenly collapsed and they all fell back onto the floor. I said to the stunt girl “You must be very skilful not to hurt yourself” to which she replied “I don't do anything clever. I just catch him and fall back. I am bruised all over. It hurts like hell. But I get paid for it!”

The next commercial featured motocross, motorbikes racing on a cross-country circuit.  To film this we went out into the middle of Suffolk, to the British team’s test area.  It was exciting stuff especially as we used members from the British team in the commercial. This time our single stuntman simply failed to turn up, so there was more negotiation and one of the British team agreed to fall off in front of the cameras.  He was well-paid, but as he again pointed out, the only thing he could actually do was really fall off - at speed.  This was bad enough in terms of the bruising himself, but the English team were going off to the European championships following day! Fortunately, the falls he had to make, for the director inevitably demanded a number of retakes, didn’t hold him back in the championship!

The biggest problem, however, came about in the key shot. Thus, as the bike went round the corner, it was supposed to throw up a dense cloud of dust, which covered the crowd: leaving the Condor smoker happily puffing on this pipe. We eventually got the shot we wanted, the crowd and the camera were covered in dust. The ensuing problem, however, was that the camera didn't like this and ground to a halt. That was the end of filming for the time being.

I never quite understood why film crews have to have all sorts of extras on hand, especially people, to cater for any emergency, but only ever hire one camera. In those days it was usually the 35mm Mitchell, and was expensive to hire -- but it was a lot less expensive than throwing away a whole day's shoot.  In another shoot later on - for Condor Ready Rubbed - we thought that the camera was making a lot of noise even through the soundproof blimp. This was designed to keep the noise away from the soundstage. We only found out later, when we came to look at the rushes, that the whole day's shoot had actually been shredded inside the camera and we had to be shoot everything again!

In a case of the motocross commercial, the big problem was that we were in the middle of Suffolk; a couple of hours away from getting a replacement camera. So, in those days before we had mobile phones, we would have had to wait four hours at least for the replacement - and by then it would be dark. Instead the cameraman took the camera completely apart and washed all the parts in petrol.  He took something like three hours to do all this and reassemble it; but it was still slightly quicker than sending for the replacement.  We then had to finish the shoot using handheld sun lamps, since it was already dusk. 

The other thing that always amazed me at location shoots was that all the comforts of home travelled with us.  The several dozen extras came by luxury coach but – more amazing to me - along with them came a complete kitchen to cook their lunch!

Gallahers was also such an important part of my life because of the social aspects.  Privately it was the first time I had my own house, down in Slough, and a young family. It was a brand new house. However, it was unusual in that it was constructed out of concrete slabs. Once the foundations had been prepared, it took just one day for the whole house to be built to the top of the roof, with the massive walls hoisted into place by cranes. I guess it was a pretty down-market house, but it was our first true home of our own. Even then we could only afford it because of my three months salary on leaving Burtons Biscuits.

But it was a comfortable terraced house, which it had a very large lounge/dining room, running from front to back for almost 20 feet; with a galley kitchen next to the dining area. Upstairs we had two large bedrooms and one small bedroom and the obligatory bathroom. It was nice and warm, being centrally heated by hot air.

We moved into the main bedroom and Sarah had the second bedroom, with Miles cosseted in the smaller third bedroom.

It had a small back garden, which I dug out to build a small patio, with flower troughs on either side of it, as well as a sandpit area. We had potentilla in the flower troughs and there was a lovely display of these throughout the summer. It was a very hot summer indeed in 1965 and we bought a big paddling pool, in which we all sat to keep cool. We also bought a big climbing frame with all the attachments -- various swings and a slide, which Sarah and her friends loved. Quite soon Miles was also climbing all over it, scaring the living daylight out of everyone – especially Pat’s mother!

Of course we had no furniture when we arrived, so we had to go out and buy the bare necessities from the local department store; on credit (the only time we ever did).  The suite in the living room was vinyl, looking like leather, and it folded down to provide a rather unstable double bed for visitors. The dining-room table was from Habitat, with a white Formica top which served us well for years; and I still have it in my office.

Upstairs we only had a double bed for ourselves and had to make do with coffee tables for the dressing table! Even so we were very happy at Chalvey. We used to go for walks in Windsor Great Park or Burnham Woods.  At home the garden was always full of children, because our climbing frame and paddling pool with sandpit attracted the whole neighbourhood.

Almost as soon as we had moved there Miles was baptised in the local church. His godparents were Jenny, a friend from Pat’s (library) workplace, and her boyfriend (later her husband - twice) Michael Jackson who was later -- having divorced Jenny twice -- to become Sir Michael Jackson the Chief of the Defence Staff!  We never rated him as that capable, but it shows what is needed to get on.

All in all, it was probably the happiest time of our married life.

However, living in Slough also meant commuting every day.  The office was in the City of London opposite Cannon Street station. There were some benefits in commuting, for the company paid for us to have cars. This was unusual for marketing staff in those days. Gallahers’ brand managers had Austin 1100s, and more important we had parking spaces in central London - actually under the arches of the Cannon Street railway bridge. These car parking spaces, it later turned out, cost the equivalent of something like a third of our salary!  The company also paid for our petrol and even for my garage at home. 

Eventually the company decided that this was a perk they could no longer afford.  On the other hand, they decided that they would lose all of us if they took our cars away. Accordingly, they gave us the cars, which was very expensive since they also to make up the income tax element of this.  The day after they had given us the cars we all went to management and asked for a rise.  When asked why, we explained that we no longer had company cars.  “But we gave you the cars” they said, to which our reply was “Many thanks for that, but it is now no longer included in our remuneration”.  The company had to give us an all-round salary increase of nearly 50%.  Just to rub salt into the wound most of us still left within three months. 

As with most commuting journeys into London it was a nightmare if you started out too late. Hence I used to leave about seven o'clock from Slough. The key thing was to hit the Hogarth roundabout, on the outskirts of Hammersmith, no later than eight o'clock.  If you made it by that time, and used all back doubles through the West End, you had a decent run to the office.  The reverse was true in the evening, so we rarely went home before seven o'clock.  Between five and seven, therefore, we used to go to the pub. This was before the introduction of the breathalyser, so I had been seen to put down seven pints of Guinness before driving home!  When the breathalyser came in everything changed. Thus, on the day it started, Roland had to go to a reception at the Swedish embassy and came back full of aquavit and as drunk as a lord.  We filled him full of black coffee until seven o'clock at night, at which point he was just turning the breathalyser a pale green; when we bundled him into his car and hoped that he would get home -- which he did

Even commuting had its best moments.  I remember driving home for the Christmas holidays when Miles was due to be christened and -- as I went along the M4 -- it started to snow. It was a wonderful start to the holidays!

Indeed almost every aspect of work Gallahers was fun.  The camaraderie was excellent.  Even though we had acquired some aspects of a spirit of competition between brand managers this was very much in fun, and never got out of hand as it did in many other companies.  Indeed, I even enjoyed the annual parties.  Pat bought an off-the-peg Cardin dress, one of the first prêt-a-porter offerings, in purple with a padded roll hem around the bottom. It was very fashionable and I guess it was the best dress she ever had! 

Regrettably, after a couple years at Gallahers, the good days came to an end. John Elliott had a bust-up with the board, typically for him over a matter of principle.  But then he left. I believe later he went to Philip Morris, as head of its European operations. When I was later at BTR, and just before I got fired from there, I was headhunted by Philip Morris -- but I didn't know John was their client and hence turned them down.  That was perhaps one of the biggest mistake I made in my life.  Had I known he was the person headhunting me I would have gone like a shot.

With John Elliott gone, Roland moved up to be the acting general manager, and I moved to be acting marketing manager in Roland’s place.  We all hoped this would continue, but the promotion mill got to work.  At first it was a game. Everyone was guessing who was to get the job. Roland was a prime candidate since he had already shadowed the job.  But, as everything was fun in those days, we started to take each other's candidates apart.  The idea was that the person with the least marks against them would win. Of course, we came a cropper. The person who actually won was someone we would never have considered possible and who accordingly had not featured in any of the character assassinations.  He was the sales manager, something of a martinet -- with absolutely no experience of marketing!  Indeed, he was one of the old school.

To be fair, when he arrived, he did try his best; but he could never replace John Elliott and we all started looking for other jobs.  Indeed the three of us found new jobs within the space of one month of each other.  I don't know what happened after that, but I believe Roland – who stayed - went on to run a chain of tobacconists that Gallahers took over. Richard went to Aspro Nicholas. It was all a terrible shame. I had immensely enjoyed my time there.  I got on with everyone, not just those within the department but everywhere else in the organisation. As just one example, as our work was so closely related to profit and loss, I even spent a lot of time with the chief accountant and was very friendly with him.  Indeed, I was privileged to be shown their records room, in a secret room built in the corner between two buildings and guarded with a bank vault door. This, he assured me, contained the real records of the company -- not those produced for public consumption!

It was as near an ideal company as I have come across; paradoxically so in view of the havoc its product was bringing to its customers' health.  The headquarters was small, probably only couple of hundred people, but everyone was very high powered -- and very bright.  What was more, we worked together as teams, and we even ate together. We had our own waitress service restaurant in the basement where we all used the lunch.  Roland, as a more senior manager, was allowed to eat in the management restaurant, but even so he often ate with us; since we shared everything. It is a shame that so many companies push their employees into much more stressful situations and do not encourage them to enjoy each other's company.  When I first joined the Open University something similar was the case, but that too soon deteriorated into the usual political in-fighting!

Even when we left, and all of us did so at more or less the same time, the camaraderie was maintained.  We had the best leaving parties that anyone ever remembered at Gallahers. Unfortunately, Gallahers decided that that was also the afternoon when they were going to interview our replacements.  This was a big mistake.  Thus all afternoon, even as the candidates came for the interviews, the whole department was playing football -- rather the worse for wear from drink. As each candidate left the office we all solemnly lined up and insisted on shaking their hand.  I doubt that they ever recruited anyone from that recruitment round.

I nostalgically remember our time living at Slough as sunny days filled with real happiness.

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