Stuart Rose's Quotes

When I got married in my twenties, I had a happy marriage and happy kids but at some point in time I let it go off the rails; I let it go off the rails.

When my mother died, my father was in a crisis, my sister was in a crisis, everyone was in a crisis. I went round the night my mother was lying in the kitchen, and I organised everything, from the undertaker to the funeral... I looked after everybody, I sorted it all out and I've done so ever since.

Customers want good value, but they care more than ever how food and clothing products are made.

I believe in a uniform for work, but why, because we're men, do we have to be ghettoised into grey suits?

I don't believe in retirement.

I think fashion is the best value way, the most affordable way in the 21st century, that men and women can express their personality.

I think that business leaders today have to be more rounded than they used to be, they have to be completely multi-functional and fast-moving.

I want to please every woman, every time.

I was the chief executive once, I've been there. My recommendation to anybody is don't go backwards.

I'd go mad if I didn't have things to make me laugh.

There is a responsibility on all companies to look at the quantum of pay and the relationship between the top and the bottom.

Was I the best husband? No. And I regret it.

We've got a bit of growth a bit earlier than expected.

As retail goes through a fundamental shift into the digital world, I believe Ocado's model and the high standards of customer service it provides will see it emerge as a powerful online player.

I actually think the whole concept of retirement is a bit stupid, so yes, I do want to do something else. There is this strange thing that just because chronologically on a Friday night you have reached a certain age... with all that experience, how can it be that on a Monday morning, you are useless?

I am absolutely a free marketeer and I believe the creation of wealth is a good thing and anyone who doesn't really needs to have their head examined - otherwise where are we going to get the schools, the roads, the universities, the third runway, dare I say it?

I am the largest market shareholder of clothing in the U.K. and I am not a destination shop for food. If the clothing market is affected - and it has been - and I hold my market share mathematically, then fine, I am doing no worse than the market is doing, which is exactly the case, but I'm losing revenue.

I have always been an advocate and was, in my last job at M&S, a supporter of the Al Gore dictum that a sustainable business can be a profitable business. We were the first sizeable company in the U.K. to prove that was the case.

I've been an employee all my life. Would I wish, if I could rewind it, to have gone down a different route? Possibly, but I've had a great time. Anyway I'm not ruling it out; I could still buy a business.

If you are not online, people look at you askance. I think in three to four years' time people will look equally askance at you if you haven't got the ability for consumers to buy what they want, where they want and how they want.