CDS SUCCESS
www.euroweeklynews.com
9 - 15 May 2019
EWN 107
Risk and reward
Billionaire butcher
M
OST of us will have shopped there, but did you know that food giant Mercadona started off life from a chain of eight small butchers? The 70 years between this small group of shops starting out and now would see Juan Roig Alfonso, Mercadona’s president go from a ‘shy’ schoolboy from Valencia to the third richest man in Spain. Roig, now worth around €8 billion, was born into the grocery trade, with his parents owning butchers in La Pobla de Farnals, Valencia Province. After graduating university in economics, the entrepreneur decided to take on the
BUSINESS IMPERATIVE: Take a chance if you want to grow. JUAN ROIG: The entrepreneur (inset) owns Mercadona. family business, buying the chain from his parents along with three of his brothers in 1981. He later bought out the company from his siblings 10 years later in 1991. A successful strategy of competitive pricing, taking chances on early technologies - including barcode scanners - and improving staff conditions, has paid off for Roig, with Mercadona now owning 1,400 stores.
F
ROM when we are very small children we begin learning lessons about risk. Whether it is touching something hot when we have been told not to, or sneaking a treat we should not have while our parents were not looking, we soon find out which risks are worth taking and which end badly. Later in life we are often given mixed messages about risk; on the one hand told it is difficult to succeed without taking chances, and on the other that
‘slow and steady wins the race.’ So which is correct for success? According to business website En trepreneur.com, not taking chances could actually be the surest way not to grow, particularly in business. It explains: ‘Many entrepreneurs will finally pull the trigger on their business - the biggest risk they've ever taken - and then want to play it safe. That’s how many businesses stagnate. To grow your business you have to go chase opportunities, and every opportunity comes with a level of risk.’