Richard Branson Quotes

Like getting into a bleeding competition with a blood bank.

The funny thing is people won’t let me pay for things. I’ll be in a restaurant and the manager will say, ‘Oh no, it’s on the house.’

One thing is certain in business. You and everyone around you will make mistakes.

When hiring somebody, I never ask to see a curriculum vitae. I feel that since I didn’t have one myself, it would be a bit presumptuous to ask to see anyone else’s.

If people aren’t calling you crazy, you aren’t thinking big enough.

Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.

Every successful businessman will have experienced set-backs and failures – they’re lying if they say they haven’t. Virgin has had some tremendously successful businesses and some that have not quite worked out. Virgin Cola springs to mind – the product wasn’t distinct enough from Coca-Cola.

There’s an inherent danger in letting people think that they have perfected something. When they believe they’ve ‘nailed it,’ most people tend to sit back and rest on their laurels while countless others will be labouring furiously to better their work!

We, we – as I say, we go in and shake up other industries and I think, you know, we do it differently and I think that industries are not quite the same as a result of Virgin attacking the market.

If you look after your staff, they’ll look after your customers. It’s that simple.

My father Ted fought in North Africa, Italy, and Germany during World War II. My grandfather survived the horrors of the trenches in World War I. I truly believe that one of the E.U.’s greatest achievements is that it has kept its members out of conflict in Europe.

Through the right people focusing on the right things, we can, in time, get on top of a lot if not most of the problems of this world. And that’s what a number of us are trying to do.

I believe in benevolent dictatorship provided I am the dictator.

Listen more than you talk. Nobody learned anything by hearing themselves speak.