Henry Ford

If a young man wants to fit himself for the Politics of tomorrow, let him fit himself into essential industry for the purpose of learning how best to conduct it for the whole public good.

Chop your own wood and it will warm you twice.

There is safety in small beginnings and there is unlimited capital in the experience gained by growing.

Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t – you’re right.

President Hoover has done everything any one could do to bring about improvement in business and industry. Everything President Hoover has advised or tried to put into effect has been sound.

See what a 25-cent raise will do to us, said Mr. Ford. So they figured the daily and monthly cost of a 25-cent increase. Put on another quarter and see what that will cost, he said. And so they went on, 25 cents a step. Finally the wage of $2.34 stood at $4.75–more than 100 percent increase. One of the associates–a good financial head–remarked rather sarcastically that if they were going to be fools, why not be first-class fools and make it $5. All right, said Mr. Ford, let’s make it $5.

Advertising is only evil when it advertises evil things.

In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative, original thinker unless you can also sell what you create.

I foresee the time when industry shall no longer denude the forests which require generations to mature, nor use up the mines which were ages in making, but shall draw its raw material largely from the annual produce of the fields. I am convinced that we shall be able to get out of yearly crops most of the basic materials which we now get from forest and mine.

Profits made out of the distress of the people are always much smaller than profits made out of the most lavish service of the people at the lowest prices that competent management can make possible.

Exchange ideas frequently.

It takes a big idea to attract the attention of consumers and get them to buy your product. Unless your advertising contains a big idea, it will pass like a ship in the night. I doubt if more than one campaign in a hundred contains a big idea.

I think everybody thought I was crazy that I quit my job and started a management company in which I was managing one client – Laura Nyro.

Many people – and I think I am one of them – are more productive when they’ve had a little to drink. I find if I drink two or three brandies, I’m far better able to write.

The five separate fingers are five independent units. Close them and the fist multiplies strength. This is organization.

They encouraged me to always look for the good in people instead of assuming the worst and trying to find fault.

Work mixed with management becomes not only easier but more profitable. The time is past when anyone can boast about ‘hard work’ without having a corresponding result to show for it.

The epiphany for me at William Morris was realizing, ‘They bullshit on the phone! I can bullshit on the phone too!’

I have no Napoleonic dream. I’m just hard working and pragmatic.

I was never involved in arms trading. In the Russian Federation, arms trading is the prerogative of the state.

There’s no better friend to any merchant than a fair competitor.