4 minute read
Exclusive interview with the visionary Mary Portas
Mary Queen of Shops
Find out how one woman is making a world of difference by Abbey Bamford
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Mary Portas is perhaps best known as the straight-talking retail consultant who made British high street businesses take stock and shape up in her TV series Mary Queen of Shops, What Britain Bought and Mary Portas: Secret Shopper. She is a self-made woman whose career in retail started by chance at John Lewis when she had to start work to support herself and her younger brother. In her early life, Mary made many sacrifices and even turned down a place at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, but it was not in vain.
John Lewis was a springboard to Harrods and later Topshop where she made her mark as a much admired and sought-after display manager. Her big break came when she got the coveted role as the creative director at Harvey Nichols.
As a mother of three children, she knows what sacrifices women must make to have a career they want and deserve. This is brilliantly put in her book Work Like a Woman: A Manifesto for Change. Mary is a woman with vision and the determination to bring it to life. She was chosen to lead David Cameron’s Government’s review into the future of the British high streets. She has launched a successful chain of Save the Children charity shops called Mary’s Living & Giving Shops, runs a creative agency Portas and is also the brains behind the concept of the Kindness Economy.
Q. What is the Kindness
Economy?
A. “Effectively it means that we need to think and be generous and kind in the way that we approach business so that we create an economy that puts people and the planet before profit. “We come from a highly consumerist society where we don’t think about the impact
that industry has on our planet. There are two fundamental changes that need to happen. One: the business world needs to change how products are made. Two: we as people need to think about how and what we buy. “It’s still an economy because businesses need to make a profit to keep going, but it’s an economy with a heart and a conscience.”
Q. You are known as a retail guru of the
British high streets. What’s your vision for their future?
A.“We have an opportunity now to make our high streets central to what I call the Kindness Economy. We’ve come to learn that what is in our local community is vital to our social structure and sense of wellbeing. That’s what I found when I did my high street report 10 years ago. “One of my visions is that everything is within cycling or walking distance of our needs. If we get that right I’ve got every hope that people will be feeding into the social progress of their community.”
Q. We’ve done phenomenally well in
narrowing the gender career/pay gaps in recent decades but there is still a way to go. What is needed now to get women on par with men in economic terms and finally close that wealth gap?
A. “Read my book, Work Like a Woman – it’s all in there. I’ve written so intensely about it and it’s absolutely central to this debate. We need to put the feminine values as the caregivers of society back into business and we need men picking up these traits too. “In my book I write about the fashion industry (of which I’ve been a part) where 60% of the workforce within it are women, but only 10% sit on boards. Clearly we’ve got a huge way to go but the more we talk about the power in the way that women work – through understanding humanity and people – the greater the chance of these values being put back into business.”
Q. You are known as a woman with
endless ideas, always tackling new projects, and you’ve recently published another book - Rebuild: How to thrive in the new Kindness Economy. Where do you find your inspiration and is there anything in the works at the moment?
A. “Central to my inspiration is my love for understanding the cultural frequency and knowing what’s happening in the world. If you’re connected to that, things just happen. Ideas come to you. “I’m back to doing my podcast, ‘The Kindness Economy’. I’m also just becoming one of the Co-Chairs on something very important called the Better Business Act, which will start to change policy at government level. That is one of the most important things I’ll be doing this year. “A vital part of the act is Section 172 of the Companies Act. We want it changed to set minimum expectations for businesses, so they don’t just think about profit, but about purpose and their responsibility to their directors, their community and to society. That should be the role of business.”
