James Cash Penney

It was always my practice to train salespeople under my direct supervision, and to treat children with the utmost consideration.

Clock watchers never seem to be having a good time.

A merchant who approaches business with the idea of serving the public well has nothing to fear from the competition.

Do not primarily train men to work. Train them to serve willingly and intelligently.

Growth is never by mere chance; it is the result of forces working together.

I believe in trusting men, not only once but twice – in giving a failure another chance.

No business can succeed in any great degree without being properly organized.

We can serve our customers well only if our buying jobs are right. You cannot sell if you haven’t ordered wanted goods into your store.

Efficient industry is the sole key to prosperity.

A market is never saturated with a good product, but it is very quickly saturated with a bad one.

My style of deal-making is quite simple and straightforward. I aim very high, and then I just keep pushing and pushing and pushing to get what I’m after.

Many manufacturers secretly question whether advertising really sells their product, but are vaguely afraid that their competitors might steal a march on them if they stopped.

There are good examples of companies – Coca-Cola is one – that invested before there was a huge market in countries, and I think that ended up playing out to their benefit for decades to come.

No unemployment insurance can be compared to an alliance between a man and a plot of land. With one foot in the land, human society is firmly balanced against most economic uncertainties. With a job to supply him with cash, and a plot of land to guarantee him support, the individual is doubly secure. Stocks may fail, but seedtime and harvest do not fail.

The thought in my mind was that I must be a good merchant. If I were a good merchant, the rest would probably take care of itself.

Competition whose motive is merely to compete, to drive some other fellow out, never carries very far.

Some people regard private enterprise as a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look on it as a cow they can milk. Not enough people see it as a healthy horse, pulling a sturdy wagon.

[On Laura Nyro] I said to Laura ‘You know Laura, I think we should sell your music publishing company. I think right now is the right time you have three songs in the top ten this may never happen again and I think we can get a lot of money for it.’ And I made a deal with Clive Davis to sell Tuna Fish Music for $4 million. And that was a hell of a lot of money in 1969. It made her famous, it made her rich. It got people to listen to her music with her singing.

If you think your boss is stupid, remember: you wouldn’t have a job if he was any smarter.

Fairs and public displays are the best means we have yet found of showing large numbers of people the real methods of industry.

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