Being happy in a recession, the Archie Norman way

Last week I listened to two highly successful businessmen tackle the vexed subject of how businesses could cope in a recession.

At The Publican​'s Pub Trade Summit former Asda boss Archie Norman and Alchemy managing partner Jon Moulton argued the UK was tipping into a longer and deeper downturn than had been seen for generations — and that things would get much worse before they improved.

Bizarrely, Norman said a recession needn't be a miserable time. As long as management was realistic and avoided indulging in the sort of delusional thinking that suggested things were OK when palpably they were not, good could come of a downturn, said our Archie.

Businesses had to cut back hard and perform better with less. There's no point in being miserable, he intoned.

Moulton - whose firm owns the Tattershall Castle Group - countered that it was inevitable people got miserable in tough times. He pointed to a slide showing a painting of Napoleon's retreat from Moscow in the winter of 1812. "They weren't exactly having a laugh, now were they?" he asked.

The pub trade was facing the worst set of circumstances in living memory, Moulton went on. Debt everywhere you looked, profits were diving and consumer confidence was in the toilet. "And it will get worse," he warned.

His solution? Don't struggle against the inevitable. Maximise your assets and your time; motivate your people; understand your customers and do anything and everything - however small - to keep sales going. Survival would take precedence over prosperity.

Moulton then discussed the tenanted pub model, which he reckoned would become less and less profitable. And while there might be a ready supply of soon-to-be jobless people seeking pubs to run, it was essential that companies priced tenancies "so the poor bastards can live". Quite. And doubtless a sentiment with which many would concur…