Henry Ford

There is no man living who isn’t capable of doing more than he thinks he can do.

Every business is a monarchy with, not a man, but an idea as king.

We do not hire a man’s history, we hire the man.

If we had more justice there would be less need of charity.

Most fashionable commodity in US is going to be old-fashioned common sense and work.

But to do for the world more than the world does for you, that is Success.

While several parties have expressed interest in buying the company, I’m not shopping it, I haven’t sold it and I’m not about to sell it.

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.

Some people have so much respect for their superiors they have none left for themselves.

This is a perverse thing, personally, but I would rather be in the cycle where people are underestimating us. It gives us latitude to go out and make big bets that excite and amaze people.

No one should buy on reputation alone. They should come and see it and inspect it, feel it and touch it.

My advice to budding property developers: do it on the cheap and you’ll get a cheap price. Don’t avoid putting in skirting just because it’s hidden by a sofa.

My mother was an entrepreneur… She found being on relief humiliating. She built this business from scratch… In 1951 my mother opened this store…

Everything I do in life is framed through the view of a businessman. That’s my instinct. If I go into a pharmacy to buy shaving cream, then I’m going to look for the best deal on shaving cream.

The consumer isn’t a moron. She is your wife.

I must have had a dozen jobs and I got fired from all of them.

[On Calvin Klein asking him ‘Why don’t you call it Geffen Records?’] People in the record business just don’t do that. They come up with names likes Asylum, Capricorn, or Island. [Calvin Klein said if you put your own name on the door ‘You’ll get laid more.’]

You don’t learn to walk by following rules, you learn by doing and by falling over.

The union organizers are asking us to sit still while it sells our men the jobs that have always been free.

Unless you are breaking stuff, you are not moving fast enough.

The relationship between a manufacturer and his advertising agency is almost as intimate as the relationship between a patient and his doctor. Make sure that you can life happily with your prospective client before you accept his account.