16 minute read
THE BUSINESS
from Qssazz
by Dosnaosya22
In the sphere of adolescent issues, such as substance abuse and acting out, Lyubomirsky says, “you have the biggest problems with the very poor and the very rich.” But it’s the latter whose families can afford private therapy, making the problems of moneyed progeny practically a specialty in their own right. Fox says family issues typically boil down to “an inability to communicate and connect.” “People think, ‘I’m giving you everything. Shouldn’t that be enough?’ Well, no, it’s not,” she says, adding that while daily life might be easier, relationships are not. (And on the subject of giving, Lyubomirsky says that parents would be wise to emulate Warren Buffett’s estate-planning philosophy: Leave your kids “enough money so that they would feel they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing.”)
Fox echoes Klein’s emphasis that young adults find selfworth and resilience in employment. And while some parents are uncomfortable discussing finances at the dinner table, she strongly recommends starting at an early age by telling children what things cost and teaching them the difference between need (they’ve outgrown their old sneakers) and want (the latest sneakers are really cool), as well as demonstrating philanthropy. Most important, she adds, is to focus on character. “Turn the lens on who you are as opposed to what you have,” Fox says.
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In the same vein, Sanderson, the Amherst professor, advises accomplished parents to consider their kids’ personalities and passions and not push their own hard-charging career paths on them or hold up “wealth as a measure of intelligence.” She recounts a brunch at her eldest child’s elite prep school, where she mentioned to their table that she thought he’d make a great high-school teacher. One parent leaned over and opined, “Oh, he’s so bright. He could do so much better.” Sanderson was appalled. “For me, it was like, being a teacher would be so meaningful,” she says. (Not to mention he’d have summers off.) But, she laments, parents all too often let status and bragging rights get in the way. W hat remains to be seen is how the psychology of money will change in the post-Covid world. Prior to the pandemic, there was already a yawning gap in the joyful experiences people could afford, but many of life’s daily irritants were equal-opportunity afflicters. Or as author Laura Vanderkam, who specializes in time management, puts it, “Whether you earn half a million a year or $50,000, you’re still stuck in traffic on your way to work.”
But the pandemic has cast a glaring spotlight on the stark differences, with the prosperous living what look to the struggling middle and working classes like vacations, in well-appointed homes with multiple freezers, ample outdoor space, swimming pools and live-in help. “When adversity hits—illness, divorce—people with wealth are buffered. That’s always been true,” Lyubomirsky says. “This is just a global example.”
Although most in the upper class are cushioned against such economic downturns, Ho says some could be feeling the heat of business failures. “When there’s a threat that it might go away, it rips into their self-esteem,” she says. “ ‘Who am I if I’m not this person who makes a ton of money?’ ”
Rubin, who blasts her followers daily uplifting quotes from Zora Neale Hurston, the Oracle of Delphi and the like, says she has sensed more reflection and gratitude of late. “Some people feel they don’t have the right to experience personal loss given what’s happening,” she explains. “Wealth is like health. When we have it, it’s easy to take for granted and not think about it. These things matter much more in the negative.”
Still Want to Buy Happiness? Here’s How.
Michael Norton, a professor at Harvard Business School with a Ph.D. in psychology, likes to quip that if you have a lot of money and are unhappy, you’re not spending it right. Here, a few ways to improve. J.B.
PRIORITIZE SHARING
Some experts posit that special experiences, including travel and entertainment, give more bang for the buck than material objects—even though experiences are fleeting. Moreover, communal experiences and, similarly, shared objects, such as a fleet of bikes for the whole clan, beat those that are for individual use.
“In general, spending money on yourself isn’t bad,” says Norton, who has researched generosity.
“It just doesn’t do much for you.”
But excessively materialistic people, Catherine A. Sanderson notes in her book The Positive Shift, have higher rates of depression, health complaints and marital strife.
BUY TIME Author Laura Vanderkam, a specialist in time management, suggests spending on extra household help or even a home closer to the office to create more opportunities for leisure, whether clocking extra hours with loved ones or just reading a good book. “Time is a nonrenewable resource,” she says. With TaskRabbit-like services widespread, there’s virtually no obnoxious chore that can’t be outsourced these days.
GIVE IT AWAY In a blow to the concept of altruism, philanthropy not only helps recipients but also has a well-documented positive emotional impact on the giver. In addition to charitable donations, spending on other people—say, a gift for your mom—also lifts your mood, as do acts of kindness. “Anything that helps you direct your focus off yourself is helpful,” says Sonja Lyubomirsky, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside.
TAKE IT SLOWLY If you’re concerned friends or lovers are interested only in your money, says Judy Ho, a clinical neuropsychologist and associate professor at Pepperdine University, then dial it down: Try a coffee date rather than a Michelin-starred restaurant. And if you’re the type who doesn’t leave the house without an entourage, remember that your personal trainer doesn’t have to fly first class just because you do. In general, Ho advises, distinguish between real friends and the paid variety.
P R O M O T I O N
in focus
WESTPORT YACHTS
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FONSECA FROM MY FATHER CIGARS
myfathercigars.com The Fonseca brand dates back to 1892, and has been produced in Cuba and Dominican Republic. Today, Fonseca is proudly owned by the Garcia family and is the newest addition to the My Father Cigars portfolio of brands. TOP RIGHT
FOUR SEASONS PRIVATE RESIDENCES ORLANDO
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BELGARD
belgard.com Belgard paves the way for beautiful outdoor living spaces. Since 1995, Belgard’s locally made and nationally backed products have transformed thousands of residential properties, creating beautiful patios, pool decks, outdoor kitchens, fire features and more. Belgard’s Bordeaux Fireplace is featured here. BOTTOM LEFT
Aston’s New Dawn (Again)
THE UK AUTOMAKER’S NEW CEO WILL HAVE TO COMBAT SLOW SALES AND AN ANEMIC SHARE PRICE, PLUS LAUNCH A NEW FACTORY IN THE TIME OF COVID-19.
Aston Martin’s new CEO, Tobias Moers, takes office this month. Even by the turbulent standards of a company that has gone bust seven times in its 107-year history, the crisis he’s parachuting into is possibly existential. Moers arrives from Mercedes’s high-performance wing, AMG, where he spent almost his entire career and became CEO in 2013. An engineer by training and a car guy by instinct, he oversaw a doubling of AMG’s model range, a four-fold increase in sales and a healthy contribution to Merc’s bottom line.
The situation he inherits at Aston couldn’t be more different. Moers was reportedly “head and shoulders” above the two other candidates, but it’s hard to imagine three well-qualified industry
leaders risking their careers by volunteering for the toughest job in luxury motoring.
Outgoing CEO Andy Palmer’s “Second Century” plan, revealed in 2015, was intended to give Aston the scale and stability it has always lacked. Few questioned the once-heretical notion of Aston building an SUV when even Ferrari and Rolls-Royce are making them, but analysts did query the speed with which Palmer and Aston’s private-equity owners wanted to expand both sales and the model range. By last summer it was apparent the wheels were coming off Palmer’s plan. Aston’s share price—already on the slide since its controversial 2018 IPO—plunged 26 percent in one day in July 2019, when Palmer’s Q2
profit warning made clear that his DB11 and Vantage sports cars just weren’t selling.
And then the Covid-19 crisis hit at exactly the worst moment: just as Aston had built and staffed the new factory in Wales, where it will build the linchpin of its expansion plans, the DBX SUV. The shock may well have killed Aston had the Canadian fashion billionaire Lawrence Stroll not previously led a consortium to invest $238 million, which gave Stroll the executive chairmanship and the group 16.7 percent of the company, with the option of increasing their stake to 20 percent.
Stroll dismissed Palmer and brought in Moers, who, despite his good humor in person, had a fearsome reputation at AMG. He once told me that no car got the AMG badge without his driving it and approving it, but his task at Aston is to fix the company rather than the product. He has to restart full production at Aston’s existing Gaydon factory and build a new car at a new factory with a new workforce in Wales—and do it to the standards fine-car customers expect. Then he needs to balance Aston’s supply-and-demand problem, getting closer to Ferrari’s model of always building one car less than the market demands, to avoid discounting.
Only then can he turn his attention to the cars. Both the DB11 and the Vantage will need revision, and there are two new supercars waiting in the wings. Likely to be launched in 2022 and 2023, the Valhalla and Vanquish are probably already well advanced, but Moers is sure to put his stamp on them. Although he’s
The Business
an enthusiast for high-performance electric motoring, Aston’s expensive plans for an allelectric Lagonda sub-brand with a sedan and an SUV have been postponed until at least 2025—and may not happen at all.
It’s hard to see why Moers would risk tarnishing a stellar, lifelong career at Mercedes with a potential public failure at Britain’s most glamorous but dissolute luxury carmaker. But some have questioned whether he’s really leaving Mercedes at all. Aston has used Mercedes’s fabulous M177 twin-turbo V-8 engine since the 2018 DB11 and also borrows its electronics and infotainment systems. Mercedes’s parent, Daimler, has a 5 percent stake in Aston, and Toto Wolff, the head of Mercedes’s F1 team, took a personal stake in Aston just weeks before Moers accepted his new job. Rather than maintaining the usual hurt silence at the loss of a valued lieutenant, Daimler CEO Ola Källenius publicly praised Aston’s hire.
The two brands seem to be getting closer. Speaking to Robb Report on the condition of anonymity, one industry insider with links to both firms speculated that Moers’s perceived risk in taking on Aston might be tempered by the belief that his former employer won’t let it go to the wall, increasing its stake or even buying out Stroll and Aston’s other shareholders. Bentley and Rolls-Royce have prospered under German ownership. Aston Martin would, too, and the 54-year-old Moers could retire as the man who finally put it on the road to stability.
A Bigger Slice of the Market
When you compare luxury automakers’ 2019 revenues, Aston Martin’s share is noticeably thinner than those of its closest competitors.
$4.22 billion
Ferrari Bentley
$1.32 billion Aston Martin
McLaren Lamborghini
$1.97 billion $2 03 billion
Take the Pledge
DESIGNER AURORA JAMES IS PERSUADING CORPORATIONS TO FINANCIALLY SUPPORT BLACK-OWNED BUSINESSES.
As the culture at large goes through a reckoning sparked by the police killing of George Floyd, questions have arisen about what can be done to achieve racial parity across institutions and industries, beyond vague platitudes. Within the fashion community, Aurora James, creative director and founder of luxury accessories company Brother Vellies, has proposed something appealingly concrete: She’s challenging retailers to vow that 15 percent of the products they carry will be from Black-owned businesses.
“I was processing [brands’ Black Lives Matter statements] as two versions of myself: as a Black woman and then as a Black business owner,” James tells Robb Report. “I realized that to appease both elements of who I am, I needed a metric.” That metric became the 15 Percent Pledge. Rounding up from the 13.4 percent of the population that African Americans constitute, she’s calling on retailers to take up her pledge.
Companies that do would start with transparency about current diversity levels by performing an audit of their vendors and publishing those findings. They would then commit to a plan to increase offerings from Blackowned businesses to hit the 15 percent benchmark.
James has focused her own efforts on signing up Fortune 500 companies because of their projected impact: Target, Whole Foods, Sephora (which has already signed up) and Walmart alone could bring $15 billion to Black-owned businesses if they fulfilled the pledge. Yet smaller luxury labels have also been eager to participate since the project’s launch in late May.
“This moment has created momentum in the population and made people think how they can do something to have a more equitable system around us,” says Greg Lellouche of online menswear retailer No Man Walks Alone. “The recognition that every one of us can make a difference economically is a defining characteristic of this particular
moment, beyond the protests.”
For Lellouche, that means adjusting the ordering process so that 15 percent of the company’s buy is from Black designers. While the brand already works with labels such as Glenn’s Denim, PostImperial and Norwegian Rain, he hopes to bring in new designers over the next two seasons to fulfill the pledge.
Lellouche says the company will use social media to update followers on the stats after every buying season. “Keeping ourselves accountable to the pledge means reordering priorities and giving more weight to Black-owned brands.” This work will come alongside a mentorship program for burgeoning Black designers and an annual $15,000 donation to five anti-discrimination charities. Mentorship programs beyond
James’s Instagram post calling on large retailers to do more has grown into a movement.
the pledge alone will be key to this process, as James points out that a lack of access to gatekeepers is a roadblock for some Black designers.
Naked Cashmere is also taking a multipronged approach, from hiring to devoting 15 percent of floor space to Black-owned brands to working with more Black influencers on social. CEO Bruce Gifford says, “This has been challenging, as the apparel business is a very white business.” To counter that, the company is also offering marketing assistance to Black-owned brands.
The hoped-for result of these combined steps would mean not only a redistribution of wealth and opportunity but also a new empowerment of Blackowned businesses. Mikelle Street
The Business
Out of Office with CHRISTOPHE CAILLAUD
CEO OF LIAIGRE
After months in quarantine, citizens around the globe value home as sanctuary more than ever. Christophe Caillaud understands that and was already positioning his company to capture the zeitgeist. He spent nine years at Jean Paul Gaultier—six as managing director and three as president— before, in 2009, joining interior-design studio Liaigre as its CEO, a post in which he assumed even more responsibility when founder Christian Liaigre stepped away in 2016. Liaigre left his firm—a practice that has garnered 35 years of international acclaim for its simple, elegant aesthetic and use of sumptuous, natural materials—in apt hands. Since Liaigre’s departure, Caillaud has opened showrooms in Shanghai and Seoul in an effort to deepen the brand’s presence in Asia; he has unveiled an airy Manhattan location in NoMad and celebrated a spectacular new fourstory flagship in Paris. “My vision is to have something a little bit softer, a little bit more casual, without changing the brand’s spirit,” he says. “Bringing a little bit more warmth can be a very good match to the time we are living in.” HELENA MADDEN
What is one thing you do to stay sane?
Exercise. I do stretches every morning for 10 to 30 minutes. I also run three times a week.
What is your biggest annoyance at work?
I hate to wait when something is scheduled. There is a well-known quote from Louis XVIII: “Punctuality is the politeness of kings.” I try to be on time, every time.
What do you look for in an employee?
Courage to do the best that you can without fear of failure or judgment. I don’t like people who are afraid to do something wrong. You should always dare, even if it’s not perfect or if it’s not a success.
How long should a meeting last?
It’s not so much the length, it’s more the efficiency. But I definitely prefer short meetings.
Do you prefer e-mail, phone, text or Slack?
I like e-mail. You can take your time writing.
What’s one adjustment everyone can make in their lives to be more successful?
It’s very personal, but having the capacity to disconnect from work helps.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received?
Make sure you’re asking a good question before you try to find the answer. People are very often rushing to find the answer without being sure the problem is well understood.
What would you tell your younger self ?
Don’t forget to be passionate. Don’t wait to be passionate. Do things by passion, and you will succeed. Whatever it is.
What’s one thing you want to improve in your work life?
To be more patient. It’s getting better with age, but I’m always trying to go very fast, and I don’t like to wait.
What was your first job, and did you learn anything from it that influenced your career?
I started in the finance department of a chemical firm in the US. It was a fantastic opportunity for me to work abroad, but I didn’t have any particular interest in the chemical industry. I realized it was important for me to have an interest in the product and service that I’m working for.
What’s your daily driver?
A BMW K 1600 GT motorcycle, which is probably far too big to drive in Paris, but I love it. It’s the only way for me to be on time to my meetings.
How have you seen priorities shift in interior design as a result of the pandemic?
Years ago, we had a lot of clients who placed emphasis on how they would host their friends at home—they would do big dinners, parties. Now more and more people want to focus on their own way of living and their families.
What’s one takeaway from working remotely?
