CHAPTER SEVEN MALCOLM WALKER

Chapter Seven - Malcolm Walker

When I started on the audit of Iceland Frozen Foods, I didn’t really recall what Malcolm Walker looked like.

In fact, I probably didn’t know, and I made a rather bizarre unthinking assumption This led to things being mixed up in my head during the first few weeks and months that I was there.

Basically, I got two people remarkably mixed up. Whenever a smart tanned chap in cream slacks and a navy blazer walked past me, generally in or near the area where the directors were based, I assumed it was Malcolm and I sort of doffed my cap to the individual in a pathetic reverential sort of way.

On the other hand whenever this other sort, a scruffy little bugger, walked past I would grunt ‘alright mate’ or something along those lines assuming that he was the gardener. You’ve guessed what I was doing already I imagine. The smart beblazered individual was the chauffeur (Hedley, I think) and the scruff was none other than Sir Malcolm Walker joint founder of the fast-growing Iceland empire!

Actually, he wasn’t so much a scruff (backtracking a bit here) but his thick head of hair, still very much in evidence to this day was very hard to control and it gave him a, shall we say, outdoorsy look.

I didn’t tend to judge books by their covers, but at that point I failed dismally, and I had made some over simplistic assumptions there. I really didn’t even think Malcolm was scruffy at all and I recall clearly that he had that thick mop of hair, but he certainly dresses very smartly now - but that’s just how I remember it.

Malcolm’s’ remarkable life story is documented in his book (Best Served Cold) and, as it all there, I felt a bit of a chump when he agreed to meet up with me and I started asking daft questions. I realised during our chat that most of the questions I wanted answers to were covered in the book and it was obvious that I hadn’t read it. (Readers, let this be a lesson for you when you are next planning to meet me in the near future).

I actually had but couldn’t remember lots of it.

It was good to see him again though. He looked well, very slim, was casually dressed but, to be honest, he also looked a bit knackered.

I asked him how he kept fit, expecting him to say that he still trained with a mutual personal trainer friend of ours in Ian Lloyd (a walking anatomy lesson) but no, he

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had given all that up. He simply hated training, so he counted himself fortunate that the weekend walk he now did seemed to be doing the trick. As well as that, he probably never sits still and is still heavily involved in the running of the business which is no mean feat at 73 (his age according to a woefully brief Wikipedia page).

I had one small similarity with Malcolm that I had never thought of until I re-read the book. (Best-selling authors is what you are clearly thinking).

But, ah-ha, there was something else, as like him I had had a dormant period where my entrepreneurial/manurial leanings were put on hold.

My stint at EY was like his at Woolworths, but to him, Woolworths was his university. He said it might be a cliche but it taught him so much, at what some people call the University of Life. He didn’t believe that anyone else in the village he came from in Yorkshire actually went to University and hence Woollies was an excellent grounding for him.

They were tough times for him at Woolies though. You could be told at the end of one week that you were to be at another store the following Monday and they would provide a hotel room for the Sunday night only. During the Monday, your first day at a new venue, you also had to find your accommodation for that night. It sounds daft but I have met so many professionals of that era who say that it was great grounding in business to be at Woolies!

Malcolm is a no-nonsense type of guy who tells it as it is. He is a Yorkshireman after all, and they just want to get to the point, which when you are discussing business is often ‘is there owt in it for us?’

They don’t chuff about and they don’t suffer fools (i.e. anyone not from Yorkshire!)

I have never really had any great awareness of whether someone is more important or not than me or whether someone is upper class or lower class, black or white or whatever. My class and race radar is sort of switched off, or maybe broken, or even was never installed properly.

I see folk as all humans.

I don’t speak differently to anyone because they are important or different or anything. Malcolm is like this and I think he likes that characteristic in other people.

Back when I mistook Malcolm for Hedley, I was nervous, but I wasn’t being a hypocrite.

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I venture that is why I have always had a bit of a rapport with him: a bit of comic banter. I am sure he would tire of me after ten minutes though because I don’t talk about business enough for him, whereas he absolutely loves it.

‘Right, that’s enough of that, let dog see rabbit’.

I do know whether he had actually ever said that, or I just made it up.

I sense that he likes cheeky people as well, people that don’t ‘kowtow’ to him but do however listen when it is time to. Yes, he definitely likes a bit of banter back, although I’m not too sure he likes having his bottom slapped by my wife, but as she can’t remember it it doesn’t count. He did squeal a bit though, but then I don’t suppose it happens that often.

I would imagine that many people are terrified of him especially at work, as after all it is Sir Malcolm Walker - the business guru and charity giant.

The best summary of what he achieved is in his own book. He built a business from nothing to sales of over £5 billion. He employed 30,000 people and probably the same again in suppliers and supporting companies. He had paid millions out to shareholders and tens of millions to charities.

He can surely sleep at night and that’s why he is SIR Malcolm after all.

The beginnings of how he and Peter Hinchcliffe started off make a great tale and they were helped along the way by the Woodwards, namely Bill and Norman (and Bill’s son Nigel), who had a frozen food distribution business of the same name. They rented cold store space out to Malcolm and Peter in the early days.

The Woodwards were, I think, like father figures at the time and the venue for the second Iceland store was largely selected because Woodwards had a cold store near there.

When Iceland’s growth led to the need for its own cold store, the Woodwards stepped up and helped again. They took shares and contrary to Malcolm’s fears they did not interfere, and they remained shareholders for around seven years until they were bought out and everyone was happy. They did well themselves as they had helped to launch the giant, and so why wouldn’t everyone be happy?

That’s great isn’t it, and I’d better get back to Malcolm, especially as I have just ruined a load of my material for chapter 11, which is about the Woodwards!

Malcolm and I digress for a second when I suggest that decent people have largely gone these days and you can no longer rely on the handshake. Actually, he says, most of the suppliers to Iceland are still working on a handshake, and they don’t do that many contracts. I am surprised, as in my experiences trust has largely gone but apparently many supermarkets work like that at the moment.

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It’s not strictly the same as what I am taking about but interesting. I’m taking about people who say they will pay you back but then decide not to. We move on.

His charitable work has been extraordinary.

It has helped many charities over the years but in more recent times he has turned his attention to charities linked to Alzheimer’s disease. His wife Ranny, his childhood sweetheart from around the age of 14/15, was stricken with it and Malcolm’s resulting charitable efforts have generated tens of millions in the search for a cure and to help future sufferers and future generations.

You are talking in excess of £24m probably. While trying to raise the original money to fight the disease, he directly contacted Professor Nick Fox who is a leading neuroscientist and then tried to raise further funds to get the leading UK experts together in a bespoke centre to research into the cause of Alzheimer’s and maybe one day a cure.

Malcolm had a brilliant brainwave when he thought about the 5p tax that came in on plastic carrier bags.

The supermarkets had to give that to charity at the time so he set about asking the leading supermarket chains to join forces with him in the fight against the disease.

From Sainsburys it was a ‘no’ (maybe they had their reasons, but I can’t imagine what), but others such as Morrisons came on board and it raised another £14m: enough to start to attract further matched funding and find the last few millions to get a neuroscience centre built.

That’s amazing and in all his charitable efforts Malcolm always got his team and his company right behind all the efforts.

Back when I worked there, I remember cycling to as many Iceland stores as I could in one day to help raise funds. I also remember that at one time custard pies were being pushed into people’s faces all over the offices. They were shaving foam I think as when I went to meet ‘someone in reception for me’ one day I got one full in the face as I came out of the stairwell.

It was so good for morale and got everyone behind it. I’m not even sure how the fundraising worked with those pies, but it just made working there so much fun.

This translates into results in more than one way and Iceland has been voted best UK employer to work for more than once in my recollection.

Going back to shortly after I had handed in my notice at Iceland in 1992 to leave and go traveling around the world, there was some sort of get together at the head office in Deeside. It was for an organisation set up for people under 40 that had made it to be CEO of a listed company, I think. There was much hectic activity 73

around the place as they made sure the head office looked spick and span as this event was to be held at Iceland’s Deeside Head Office.

It was not just offices there, as there was also a two million cubic feet cold store on site so it was all hands to the pump. We had to make sure for a start that there was no litter anywhere in the warehouse. That wasn’t easy with millions of boxes and packaging passing through the place on a daily basis.

As you might recall, I was the controller of the finances for the distribution side of the company and Richard Horswill was the manager of the Deeside depot.

I’m on the tall side but this bugger fell asleep in a greenhouse with his feet in a growbag under a dripping tap. As we were chatting Malcolm came around the corner.

‘It’s looking really quite good Richard, well done’, he didn’t notice me so was probably forgetting who I was again. Easily done.

In my usual style I interjected:

‘Actually Malcolm, we have been dropping bits of litter around the place all day just to try and make it look a bit more realistic.’

I thought to myself that even I didn’t know where this nonsense came from all the time at such short notice:

‘Ah yes, you, you cheeky sod, I heard you were buggering off and leaving us. Hallelujah!’

‘Next Wednesday Malcolm, off to Bombay and then the rest of the world beckons’

‘I can’t deny that I wish I could come with you’ he said rather unexpectedly.

‘If you can find fifteen hundred quid by Sunday you’re in, Malcolm’ I added.

‘Ha Ha’ he retorted ’I could probably manage that but I can’t leave this place’

He was right and how prophetic those words were. He hasn’t, to this day, left the place apart from a couple of sabbaticals which you’ll find out all about if you read his book. I do keep telling you).

I ask now whether he struggled with that work/ life thing. But he reveals to me that he actually did get it right while accepting that a lot of his friends and colleagues didn’t.

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He never worked weekends and he proudly tells me that he never missed the sports day, school plays and so on. That’s remarkable as his work life has spanned periods when work / life balance was not really understood.

Apparently, Peter Hinchliffe was a morning person and Malcolm came in later and worked into the night so there was one of them there all the time and their partnership worked.

It is a long debate I suppose but do we work too hard now and do we spend too much time at work?

He is adamant that retiring is bad for you and I know that he has a point. How many people stop what they are doing and within months they are ill or indeed dead?

But I think the Dalai Lama said something like:

‘We work all our lives to make money at the expense of our health and then we have to spend all that wealth trying to get our health back’.

I’ve probably got that horribly wrong, and he would have said it better than me for a start, but it sounds about right to me and deep enough for Dal, as his mates call him, to come out with.

We all do it: work ourselves to death and then wonder why we did it when we realise it’s nearly all over!

During the final throes of writing this drivel, (err, sorry, future best-seller) a large virus beset the world and one of its legacies might be that large swathes of the ‘developed’ world change many of their ways of working. We will see. They may not.

Malcolm did try to retire but he had some bad luck and some bad experiences along the way and I suspect that he is now resigned to continuing on at the wonderful beast he created. But why not, he enjoys it.

As of today’s date, he and his son Richard along with long serving Tarsem Dhaliwal and others I’m sure Malcolm can slowly let go of the reigns. They are very bright guys and still full of energy.

Did I just say that Malcolm was slowing down?

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He has been getting out and about lately and he did head up

Everest in his late 60s and is adamant that it was a bloody daft idea.

Yes, he absolutely hated it and he didn’t think he would have found it any different when he was younger.

He reached the South Col at 23,000 feet. I’ve been up to 17,500 feet and that was no fun and at 32 years of age, so I can imagine what he means.

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Many of his answers about that Everest trip are surprising me. I thought he would tell me how amazing it was. He is dead honest. His son Richard probably could have gone and summitted but he stayed with Dad, and helped create a magical tale.

He also was enticed to try and trek to the South Pole and he informs me that was even worse! But he has seen some amazing things even if he wasn’t too comfortable at the time.

I guess in retail they have a lot of fun and there’s a lot of adrenalin and all that but, in my opinion, there is a danger that they don’t ever realise their personal ambitions.

(Maybe their personal ambition is to immerse themselves in retail all their lives and to be rich).

When they are younger, I think it’s too easy to forget that they will be older when they finally have time to do the things they plan.

The Director immediately above me in Iceland announced, when I told him what I was going travelling, that he intended to retire at 52 and sail around the world. I don’t think he ever did.

Many people said at that time, when I told them my plans, that they would do something like I was about to do when they were older but the funny thing is I don’t think they either felt like it or felt up to it when the time came.

I am so glad that I did it when I did. It changed my life path and I truly believe for the better.

Getting older affects everyone slightly differently but at whatever age it happens, we all get risk averse if we are lucky enough to live to our older days.

We all fancy the couch instead of the nightclub and yes, while that can happen at many different ages it will undoubtedly happen. Even in the extreme cases where the spirit is always willing the body will let you down and I can only think of Peter Stringfellow as an exception here as I believe he partied until the end.

Oliver Reed too, and maybe most players of the game of rugby union!

Oh, and Andy & Patricia, don’t forget them.

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Back in 1992, I made my own decision that life was going by too quickly and I needed to get off the roundabout for a while. I expected my Mum to be furious, sad and so on and my Dad to be upbeat and say ‘Go for it son; have a beer on me ’ .

After all he had given up medicine to try farming when he was about 36 and that’s quite a gamble and a challenge.

But actually, when I announced to him that I was heading off to Bombay (he was 62 at that stage in his life) he said I was totally mad.

‘What about your pension, and what about your Iceland shares?’

But I knew what I was doing was right, and I did it and I don’t regret it one bit. I refer to it as my early midlife crisis.

Meanwhile Malcolm was to spend a life in frozen food and bloody hell, is he, and was he, good at it. You so seriously have to read his book. It’ s not a patch on this, but it’ s still an interesting read.

He got pretty much thrown out of his own creation at one stage and had to watch while another group of retailers, who thought they knew what they were doing, came in and cocked it up royally.

It’s an amazing story of how they made a pig’s ear of running it. It gives a marvellous insight into the machinations of the cut-throat business world.

When Malcolm and Andy P regained control, they knew exactly what they had to do to turn it back around again and they did it without faltering. They orchestrated a few very basic and very clever manoeuvres. They did it quickly and brutally and it worked, and many people have benefitted from the Iceland success again.

Whatever I have said about work / life balance Malcolm and Andy and all their cronies had a great time running that company. They loved retail and the fast pace and the hustle and bustle. They have both then fitted in some serious adventures, Malcolm’s Everest is one and Andy has been virtually everywhere since he sold his shares.

Malcolm has owned or had access to a private jet for much of his adult life. Not many people can lay claim to that. I am discussing him as if we are best mates, but I actually don’t know him that well as I am sure he will be muttering as he reads this.

I am told by closer friends, who have spent many years with him, that he is OCD, and this has made him tidy and ordered beyond what is generally seen as normal.

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I once went on that jet (a few times actually) and prior to take off and in the swanky lounge that often precedes a private jet flight, I was warned more than once to go to the loo while I had the chance.

I thought this was a bit odd. I was a grown up and it had been weeks since I had wet myself. We were pouring cold beer down like the four-minute warning had gone off and it was a two and a quarter hour flight with more alcohol flowing freely so maybe that was why we were being warned about loos.

Maybe the one on the jet got full easily?

It turned out that the order was because Malcolm didn’t like people using his loo!

This immediately put one thought into my head:

‘I must use that loo’.

I think Andy P whispered to me that number ones were actually OK as that was almost unavoidable but number twos - no way Jose.

Here’s that same comical urge coming over me again, as I now needed to use that loo (or at least make it seem very likely that I had) and Malcolm needed to find out.

Later on, during the flight I sat on the loo, half cut and with my trousers around my ankles while someone photographed me while also convulsed with childish laughter.

I think they sent the photo to Malcolm later that night, but I can’t be sure. They might have sent it to someone who they knew would show Malcolm, again I’m not sure.

For the record that did happen, but I have heard other people telling the same story with them in the hot seat, as it were (Steve Stuart for one), but that’s as maybe. I did it and it was very funny, and of course the copious amounts of inflight alcoholic drink helped.

I was recently appointed to the board of the Liverpool Society of Chartered Accountants (LSCA) and we were looking for a high-profile speaker to address the next business members meetings.

I sent Malcolm an email and I bet you can guess what’s next.

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I wrote something along the following lines:

Hi Malcolm,

I hope you are well. You might be surprised to learn that I am now on the board of the LSCA and in September we are seeking a high-profile guest speaker for our quarterly get-together - blah blah , chat chat, and anyway - can you give me Tarsem Dhaliwal’s email address please?

He took it well.

He called me a cheeky bugger and then said he would do it. A week or so later, he found out he was in Italy at that time and hence couldn’t now do it.

This might be a good point to tell you that all the big bosses of big companies haven’t got a clue what they are doing from day to day because someone else arranges it all for them (Kathy in Malcolm’s case) but the bosses always forget that. She must have informed him of where he would be when he told her what he had gone and arranged on his own and unsupervised.

Groups of PA’s must roll their eyes when they get a chance to chat about the antics of their bosses.

‘What’s he like, he tried to make a sandwich on his own the other day bless him, we are still rebuilding the kitchen…. Etc’

Anyway, my attempts at humour then came back to bite me. Tarsem (Chief Exec at Iceland now, and he’s done well, starting as a young Birkenhead lad- in fact, so good looking that in a rugby match you would never get tired of punching him) informed me that he was hoping that Malcolm couldn’t do the event for me so he could then very happily refuse me for asking him second.

Brilliant.

Anyway, the smooth entertainer Nick Canning (joint CEO at that stage) did a splendid job and all’s well that ended well.

When I went for that coffee with Malcolm, all my great plans got forgotten.

I had planned to try and get into the restaurant there for lunch as it is absolutely amazing and I hoped to get a freebie. Back when I worked there it was an unbelievable space. I recall Malcolm had a Harley Davidson on show in there and I think the place was called Roxys. It surely deserved a Michelin Star! The food was amazing and of course heavily discounted and it was like a night out for me.

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I meant to ask him if he actually is a ‘fusspot’.

I got this from Johnny Prestt (chapter 10) when he told me the tale of the dolphin fish. It was on a chopping board on a boat in 1997/8 and Malcolm rang the ship’ s operator to make sure the paint on the chopping board didn’t have any lead in it.

When I leave that meeting at his plush offices, I realise I missed a few bits out and, being too scared to ring him again, I ask Andy P.

“What about sport and hobbies for Malcolm?”

“Well,” he says, “I have a classic about football. He totally hates football.

“He was once introduced to Rafa Benitez who was the very successful Liverpool Football Club manager. People standing nearby who knew the people being introduced to each other held their breath. Malcolm kept it simple and told Rafa he had never heard of him and he hated football.”

Malcolm also hates golf but does seem to relish sports where there is a death such as shooting and fishing.

That Andy Ps’ words by the way Malcolm!

He is certainly a good shot, and I have seen that, but I have never been fishing with him. I’m not good enough anyway, even though I occasionally land a big one (see later).

Andy reminds me that Malcolm also likes a nice car. I remember when I was at Iceland and I got my lovely new Vauxhall something or other (I’ m not into my cars. It was red).

I think Malcolm had a Bentley Mulsanne Turbo: very classy. He changed it shortly after that and got something also amazing, sporty and so on. I did tell you we had so much in common.

Enter Rob Andrew stage left. This is not the Rob Andrew you might have heard of, so please, calm down ladies, as it’s not the very good-looking England rugby player from the 1980s and 90s. This is the hard drinking, scratch golfing, wine quaffing, fashion icon of the same name.

Stand down ladies.

The bright trousers will initially attract you, rather like some of the exotic birds in Attenborough documentaries, but in this case you will soon see through the show and be disappointed.

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Yet, hold on, one bird did fall for that show. Rob did find a mate and one, as they say in lads’ chats, out of his league. I don’t just mean he’s division 2 while Julie his wife is division 1. I mean Julie is up in the Champions League and Rob is wading through mud every Sunday in the Sunday League.

Anyway, back when Rob had not yet achieved the heights he now has in business, he was working at Iceland. I think he was in charge of spare car keys and topping up the windscreen squirter bottles, or some such.

Iceland’s legendary charitable efforts that year were, I think, still supporting the Peto Institute. Rob came up with an idea to wash the Directors (expensive) cars for charity.

I’ve just realised that Rob might not want me to tell this tale. Oh what the hell, he’ll be fine. He is up for anything.

It was all going well, and so I won’t build it up, I’ll just go straight to the punchline. It was all going well until his foot got trapped in one of the cars as he stumbled. The foot fell onto the accelerator. The lavish, automatic vehicle, with its engine quietly running, revved up frantically and took flight only to plough immediately into another similarly innocent and expensive car causing tens of thousands of pounds of damage. Oh Lord, Rob.

Now I’ve written it down, it isn’t actually that funny. Rob was quite seriously hurt, but you know what they say about publicity.

His career has been meteoric since then. He is a very funny guy and maybe the injuries led to his bizarre taste in colourful trousers and some subliminal urge to disguise the blood and bruising. Attenborough would be able to explain it better.

Anyway, for those concerned at this juncture, Rob and Julie are fine. Poor Julie.

I also didn’t cover restaurants with Malcolm. I didn’t really dare to ask him, probably because my foray into that sector had cost me everything myself.

On the face of it he seems to have done well in that sector. He went into the restaurant world with entrepreneur and pal Steve Walker (no relation) when he invested in the Piccolino chain. That seems to be going very well. He has also set his own up, with the Opera Grill in Chester. It seems too huge in my mind to make a profit, but it’s pretty spectacular inside and what do I know.

I think, if I was Malcolm, I would be reading my own book and reminding myself of the lessons he tells about his diversifications in his early days.

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Sir Malcolm has been there, done that and got the tee shirt. What a life so far!

Finally, while I cannot understate how much he has done for charity I do now anticipate that when we next meet he will tell me that his hardest charitable act to date was ‘buying your ruddy awful goddam book.’

And really, finally, I read recently that he had abseiled down the Shard for charity. Say no more.

Here’s Prince William meeting, now, Sir Malcolm.

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