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Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE

October 04, 2021 / 01:33:32

This episode features Jacqueline Gold, CEO of Ann Summers, discussing her journey through personal and professional challenges, including childhood trauma, breast cancer, and her pioneering work in sexual empowerment.

Gold shares her experiences of overcoming a difficult childhood marked by abuse and her determination to achieve financial independence. She reflects on the impact of her early adversity on her career and how it shaped her mission to empower women.

Gold also addresses her battle with breast cancer, emphasizing her resilience and positive mindset throughout the treatment process. She highlights the importance of optimism and courage in facing life's challenges.

The conversation touches on Gold's role in transforming societal attitudes towards sex and sexuality through her work at Ann Summers, where she has been a trailblazer in promoting sexual empowerment and breaking down stigmas.

Gold's story is one of strength, courage, and the drive to create a positive impact, making her a notable figure in both business and social change.

TL;DR

Jacqueline Gold shares her journey of overcoming trauma, battling cancer, and empowering women through her work at Ann Summers.

Episode

1:33:32

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the diver ceo live my live show my live reincarnation of this podcast is coming on tour and it's coming to a city near

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you there's a link in the description below put your email address in and i will email you when tickets go on sale

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can't wait to see [Music] i know what i've done has been culture

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changing and i'm super proud of that all hell would kick loose if that happened today i was poisoned by my

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nanny i've had a bullet through the post it was so important to me not to feel like a victim you know anybody that's

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listening will not know the crusade that i've been on i don't really know what to say honestly i feel speechless yeah

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gosh it is hard i was diagnosed with breast cancer when i spoke to the

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consultant he said [Music]

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jacqueline gold she is one of the most successful business women in europe she's also one

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of the wealthiest women in the uk and she's certainly one of the most inspiring people i have ever

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ever met just remarkable but her road to success is one of the

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most devastatingly misfortunate tragic heartbreaking roads i think we've

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ever heard travelled on this podcast imagine me speechless this podcast made me speechless not once

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not twice but over and over again she is and has been the ceo of anne

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summers for decades a company that if you don't know is known for popularizing sex toys

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dismantling the unhealthy archaic stigmas around sex and starting a crusade to make sex i'm a widely

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accepted part of all of our lives but her story twists and it turns the

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lessons the courage the resilience the heartbreak the pain this should be a movie you just couldn't

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make it up jacqueline thank you for your honesty thank you for your courage and thank you for the

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inspiration i know that it will stay with me for a lifetime without further ado i'm stephen bartlett

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and this is the dire ceo i hope nobody's listening but if you are then please keep this to yourself

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[Music]

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i really hate when um podcasts are quite predictable however i've noticed that in my podcast i've continued to start in a

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very similar place and it's i can't get away from it and the place that i always tend to start is

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about the person that sat in front of me early years and how those early years have shaped

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them and as i was reading about your story i actually read that you'd said that i read that you'd said your early

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adversity heavily shaped who you are today and who you became and influenced the career

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journey you took so i have to start there and i feel like i always start there but can you tell me

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about that early adversity that you're talking about yes i can um

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i had a really unconventional and challenging childhood

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my parents split up when i was 12. my sister was a lot younger than me she was seven years

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younger than me so it didn't impact her in the same way as it impacted me

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um i found it it was quite traumatic i

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actually stayed down a year at school because of the impact it had on me

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and at the same time my mother moved in with her boyfriend um

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who sexually abused me between the age of 12 and 15. you know and that combined with a mother

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who was overprotective you know wouldn't let

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me or my sister just do anything and play in the normal way

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you know we weren't allowed to go to sleepovers or parties or anything like that

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but then when it came to this abuse which i believe she knew about

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um you know we were left in the most vulnerable situations

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um you know she was quite a complicated woman and you know we were in a

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a pretty tough situation so for me later in life in fact i say later in

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life i probably was about 15 you know finding financial independence was

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really important to me because that was my escape it's hard to it's hard to imagine a

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parent knowing about about that especially as you say one that was so

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risk adverse was so keen to keep you in the house to not let you outside because you might

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fall into a dangerous situation but

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would turn a blind eye tonight i mean you know i've tried to

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rationalize this myself numerous times because she was she was quite ill in her later years so

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i didn't challenge her i just felt she was and even in her earlier years i just felt

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i always felt she was very vulnerable herself um

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you know just she she once said to me if i could live in the middle of a field

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with no one around me i'd be happy so she herself wanted to be protected

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in one sense you know she she wouldn't even let my sister and i play in the front garden in case we were kidnapped i

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mean it was you know totally irrational and yet

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stayed with a man you know i remember overhearing her on a in a phone conversation with her sister

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after he'd returned after a year's break and i remember hearing her say yes i

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know he's a bastard but you know i i don't want to be on my my own it was just a toxic you know a toxic

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relationship a toxic environment um and i and

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you know i i have forgiven her um

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but i feel very sad for for her and and the life that she lived

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did she ever admit to knowing that her partner was abusing you no

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did you ever ask her i didn't ask her but there were many occasions when i

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called out for help and a couple of occasions that she either witnessed or

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overheard me telling someone you know i was told off for telling lies

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even my aunt has later told me that she saw something going on she told my mum about

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it who played it down so there were lots of situations where it was clear to me that

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she would have known do you know much about her upbringing and what might and what um

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the early sort of experiences that shaped her no i mean i i think that i mean my

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grandmother was lovely um my grandfather was an authoritarian

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um you know her sister grew up

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you know perfectly well but she she was very was was very insecure

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beautiful woman you know very elegant but you're just scared of life

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and your younger sister you've got a younger sister i have yeah she's uh

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seven years younger than me fantastic business woman great people person and somebody who

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really you know i admire her so much vanessa we have a

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great relationship and she's funny and engaging and

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yeah and she's my best friend you grew up in the same household with her but you turned out to be very different

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people and you're only a couple of years apart because you talked there about at the very start about how just being a

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couple of years apart in those early years experiences even if you're in the same household can create two completely

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different people because they both experience very very different things because of age

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and i i really resonated with that because um like even in my in my childhood my family became on the verge

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of bankruptcy when i was um old enough to know what was going on but

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my older brothers and sisters kind and also when i was probably most influential so sort of easily influenced

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like adversity showed up in my childhood when i was when i was at like the ripest of ages um

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and so i'm very very different from my brothers and sisters and i kind of felt that from what you said there the difference between you and vanessa

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was just a couple of years off but um you experienced very different things in those early years

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yes i think vanessa was also a bit more outspoken than me and i think that

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you know as a child maybe it was because of the way my mother was and the fact

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that you know for my first um seven years of life i was an only child

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and uh i don't know but i i was very

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i was very shy and i remember my mother used to if we went on a beach holiday she used to draw a circle in the sand

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put me in the middle and i wasn't allowed outside that circle um so i i never really had opportunities

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to make friends with other children and engage with adults i was i always felt quite lonely

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bizarrely whereas i think the second child always

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you know has it easier in my opinion um as i keep reminding my sister

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and so you know she just was that much more confident more much more outspoken so

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i don't think she was ever you know likely to be a

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a target i'm not saying she wasn't but because we we haven't spoken about it

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but i think she's less likely to have been a target of of abuse than i was

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um you've never spoken about it well we have spoken about it but i don't think she wants to

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she just doesn't want to talk about her experience which is which is you know i respect

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that and you know and everybody deals with

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adversity in different ways um

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and you know no matter how successful somebody is or privileged they may be

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you know it doesn't change you know the the challenges that we might experience

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along the way and everybody deals with them in different ways and for me

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it was so important to me not to feel like a victim i didn't want to feel like

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a victim i hate the word and that's not to say you know that

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other people handle it wrong it's just for me i just wanted to

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i suppose gain something from that bad experience you know whether it be proof that i can

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you know and actually i've experienced adversity throughout my life i've i've been quite unfortunate you know in that

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way um you know i lost my son when he was six years old

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i was poisoned by my nanny i've had a bullet through the post so i've had a number of challenges

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subsequently to the childhood experience but certainly just going back to that the

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childhood experience did i believe shape who i am today i

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think it drove me to want to go out and work hard uh have that financial independence you

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know i was always curious always talking to people always looking for

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inspiration i guess and so much of just thinking about that as well so much of your work now because

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i've been through your story multiple times and looked at the way that you've made your decisions and so much of it is

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is centered on that idea of like empowerment and giving you know empowering people to be free from

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whatever their prisoner might be and sometimes prisoner is society sometimes it's

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social narratives whatever else but um i've really i deeply respect that about you

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because i read there was a day in your story where you confronted your abuser and that ended up

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being a really pivotal moment could you tell me about that yeah

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um gosh it is hard yeah going back and remembering those

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periods in time that you you just want to park away but

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i was 15. i'd be trying to plan how i was going to do this for some time

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but obviously you lack the courage you know i was a very young 15 year old as well

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um and i didn't want to

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you know generate anger i mean he was the rows that my mother used to have the

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coercive control that i witnessed made me want to make this as

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you know easy as possible so in my childish way i decided to

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tell him it wasn't fair on mum so it was

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i was trying to i mean is this something we do as

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as girls i think girls are brought up to be helpful and to please people please

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and this is you know i'm sure we're coming on to empowerment but that was

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you know that was the problem i was brought up to be well behaved and to be a people pleaser and take john up a cup

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of tea and you know he likes you and this all this type of stay inside your circle

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yeah um [Music] so for me the best way to handle this

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was to help him not lose face or not feel bad or

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so and he he just he didn't really say anything he just

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shrugged um and that was it was as easy as that and

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it never happened again but i didn't when i look back or if i was talking to

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my you know young self now

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i didn't realize you know that i could stand up to him and that i

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was perhaps more powerful than i realized i'm disappointed as an adult that i felt

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i had to approach it in the way i did but then i forget that that you know i

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am an adult i was a child then and

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i was incredibly brave you know i could have done nothing

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um and i did i was able to bring it to an end um

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and you know whilst it's very difficult to forgive somebody that has put you

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through that much pain and trauma in your life

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um as a person i have to take positives from anything negative that happens to

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me and everything that i've been through that for me is how i survive that's for

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me how i better my life how i go on to better things and

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you know i turned my focus to work and to ambition and

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being curious and learning different things and then just seeing this opportunity which actually

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turned out to be a great opportunity to empower women

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you know a lot of people are well because you went through that abuse why would you go into something like

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this but there was an opportunity there and

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you know fast forward i mean i'm 61 now i was 21 when i

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started so fast forward 40 years 25. you say all the right things whatever

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you do you're 61. [ __ ] me mental that's crazy

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so i know what i've done has been culture changing and i'm super proud of that i really am

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and you know i've you know anybody that's listening that is 25 will not know the crusade that i've

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been on for the last 40 years i mean it's you just wouldn't believe that you you

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know what you couldn't do and what you what you couldn't do then what you can can do now

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and the changes and attitudes of you know the generations of today compared to the generations then i

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really want to talk about that because i know you've had some really tumultuous experiences going on that crusade and i

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love i love talking about shifting perceptions and also we've seen in our lifetime how quickly a lot of

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perceptions have shifted around like you know equality and sexuality and gender and um the crusade that you you

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know led i think is is has been a really important one and probably more important than a lot of people realize

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um i wanted to pick up on one thing you said about you being shy you know the what you've gone on to do

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in your career and life and the crusade you've led is not one that would you know one would think would be led by a

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shy person the person that i've met today doesn't seem to be a shy person necessarily to me seems to be one of conviction and

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confidence and belief in hindsight how did you go from being that shy person that was kind of

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coddled um at an early age by a mother that was risk adverse

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drew a circle around you in the sand didn't let you off the front garden to being the person you are today what

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is it that check that what is it that does that to somebody um well i think there's a few things

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around this because um i don't think this is exclusive to me i think a lot of women especially

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uh experience this i think well first of all i i might be wrong but i don't think we're

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born shy i think it's our situational environment that creates that and

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secondly you can be shy but still have fire in your belly which is what i had

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you know i had that ambition and that burning desire and

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when you have that passion you have to release it you can't keep it

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inside just because you're shy and um i think there were many things that i did you know i remember

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in my very early 20s holding a conference my first conference for my

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army of of um sales ambassadors which i had about 500 in my first year franz summers veranda

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summers yes and i held this conference at the grand hotel in

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brighton and i thought it was a great idea when i planned it because the whole idea is to

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engage with your teams and tell them about what you're doing and what your mission is and get everybody involved

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and on the journey and it was sort of you know a few hours before i was going on stage

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i was thinking oh my god what am i doing because this was like

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horror to me i had no experience and i was you know absolutely terrified

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but if you're talking about something that you are passionate about

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i think it changes it it's not the same as doing your best man speech or

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you know getting up for school and doing your first speech when you're talking about something that you really care about

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and that you live and breathe once you get out there and you've got

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that first sentence out the way i do think it changes you yeah and you

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know that's what it did for me so i

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i am a great believer that courage comes first and i've always had a lot of courage

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and i think if you have the courage eventually the confidence will come

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yeah so yeah from what you've said there it's like the courage is creating is forcing you to create evidence for yourself yeah it's forcing you to step

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outside your comfort zone and then we all know anyone that's successful knows that when you do

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great things happen yeah and your comfort zone then expands becomes a bit bigger and then you step on other than

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exactly interesting um so you said they're about work and you've always had that drive when i was reading through a story again

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i i heard about one of the things your mum did allow you to do was to work um

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and so i was i was thinking about the the relationship work you then had in your

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life from a very early um from a very early stage if if work was the place that you were allowed to go to

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to leave the home then was it was it an escape from home was it

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like a the place of freedom in your life it was so freedom i mean

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well first of all i can't tell you the countless times i asked her if i could go to a sleepover or a

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you know party or just things that normal kids do and it was always no um

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and there was another sort of form of abuse was this they had

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her and her husband had this uh her new husband had this task mask

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task master approach to everything they did and it was you know there was no end to it

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you it's never like you could ever finish the tasks and they were

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like digging the garden um they weren't like cleaning the kitchen they were like digging the garden bringing logs up you know it was

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very it was manual labor for my sister as well and it was like these jobs will never

00:22:58

get done so we'll never be able to go out a bit like cinderella as i'm telling the story it sounds a bit like that

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um but she seemed to accept things that were traditional

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so going to work was something or getting a saturday job is something that people do

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so that was okay so i couldn't get a bus into bromley to meet up with friends but i could

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get a bus into western to go and work at the spinning wheel as a waitress

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so did you look forward to that ah absolutely and of course there weren't the rules then you know i was working

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at 14 years old i worked in a bar at biggin hill airfield i did waitressing i

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worked in a hairdressing salon so um

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yeah that was a release did you try and work all the time more hours over time and actually it

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compromised my schooling because i i didn't really invest in my schooling i

00:24:01

just wanted to work so i didn't go to college or university or

00:24:08

anything that i expect my daughter will probably do now was there um

00:24:13

and i would i do want to to talk about some of these other points around empowerment but was there

00:24:18

any physical and i don't think people think about this enough but one of the things i've i've got we're increasingly

00:24:23

fascinated by was the connection between like psychological trauma and physical impacts so the on our physical health

00:24:30

and how the two are somewhat interlinked and was there any sort of physical

00:24:36

symptoms or consequences of that psychological trauma that reared their head

00:24:43

so interesting you say that because i have a stalker um and his mother many years

00:24:49

ago many years ago and the impact was tinnitus i had tinnitus

00:24:55

yeah and all through there because they they caught them it was went to trial they

00:25:01

were um found guilty i mean it was it's another i mean it's a

00:25:06

crazy story it's a crazy story can you describe so tinnitus is when you get the ringing in the ears but actually

00:25:13

i just had this marching it was a constant marching and it doesn't stop so when you go to bed you've got you know i

00:25:20

had it oh did you so i know very few people will know what tinnitus

00:25:25

is like unless you've had it because it sounds trivial if i say to you oh it's just like a ringing in the ears or whatever people

00:25:31

go that's fine like i've been to a gig before my ears have run yeah but you get like day two into it and i so i got

00:25:38

tinnitus for right so i go on google what's this ringing in my ears and why wouldn't it stop and that must have been about

00:25:45

six years ago seven years ago and then you get to day three and you're losing your mind and i'm on these forums and people are like people commit

00:25:51

suicide because of because of it and i i kind of understood why yeah it was like a form of torture

00:25:58

sleep you wake up it's constant you're eating lunch your ears are ringing and there's no end to it there's nothing

00:26:03

you can do to stop it so fortunately you know talking about my experience with it one

00:26:08

day i don't really know what happened but your sinuses are connected to ears that's when i came to land when i had tinnitus tinnitus

00:26:15

and i think it must have been because my sinuses were blocked because on day nine of my ears ringing it just

00:26:20

stopped and some people live with it for life yeah i mean i was very fortunate i think

00:26:26

i had it for about three months and then it stopped so i was very lucky i mean some people have to live it live with it

00:26:33

um but mine was definitely brought on by that awful experience

00:26:39

and obviously the abuse i i i did i mean i had a severe sorry to be graphic but severe

00:26:46

constipation that um i look back and i think was

00:26:53

you know brought on by my own trying to be in control behavior just remembered as you said that i

00:27:00

remember going to the doctors about it and blurting out to the doctor what was going on at home

00:27:08

and the doctor and i said and i'm really worried because i've got a younger sister

00:27:13

and the doctor said to me um okay do you want me to get social services involved oh no no no because

00:27:20

you know as a child you think you're going to be in trouble you think you're going to be taken away from your mum

00:27:26

and she's ok i mean

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i mean all hell would kick loose if that happened today i don't really know what to say honestly

00:27:37

i feel speechless because you just can't imagine an adult hearing that these days and

00:27:43

and posing the question to you about next steps just think that just seems unthinkable

00:27:52

perceptions have changed a lot haven't they around sexual abuse and um

00:27:58

and and also victim blaming which i think was was a was a really

00:28:03

destructive habit that society had which fueled the problem not having a safe environment to to

00:28:10

speak thinking that you'd be blamed or you know absolutely i think there's still our

00:28:16

challenges i don't think this is a problem that's gone away just because we're all more vocal

00:28:22

and i did a a a project recently and just going off piece for a moment i was

00:28:28

quite surprised about consent and i i did a workshop on consent and

00:28:36

i think there's a lot that we don't know we don't realize and i did a

00:28:42

piece around talking to university students and you know some

00:28:48

girls go to university expecting to be assaulted so i do still think there is a lot

00:28:54

a lot more education that's needed and maybe that's because i'm the mum of a 12 year old daughter so things like

00:29:00

that sort of resonate with me more i've got to be honest um i completely

00:29:05

agree and i think as a man um there is a ton of education that we need

00:29:12

to understand this topic um from the other side of the spectrum as well

00:29:17

because a lot of my friends find themselves in a place my male

00:29:22

friends where they are like naive and they know they're naive to what

00:29:27

consent means i i really agree with you i really agree with that and i think that i just think

00:29:33

there should be more emphasis in schools we should be talking about consent more i interestingly when i did this project

00:29:40

i met a trans man and he was telling me that when he was a

00:29:46

woman he experienced certain attention unwanted attention

00:29:52

and obviously saw it from a female point of view and then when he transitioned to a man

00:30:00

he was just blown away by some of the things that he was hearing from a man's point of view so um

00:30:09

yeah that that was quite uh enlightening and interesting those are the conversations we need to be having for

00:30:14

sure for sure you um you said that you talked earlier

00:30:19

on about how you know hard times shape you and i you know it's clear that from everything you've

00:30:25

said that resilience is one of your superpowers i've i've actually heard i've heard that written a few times when people talk

00:30:31

about you what does that mean to you resilience think that's true i i think i am a

00:30:38

resilient person i think um for me

00:30:43

the battle is won before the war has even started so for example

00:30:50

i was diagnosed in 2016 with breast cancer i remember my

00:30:56

husband and my sister when they were first told the news i could tell they'd been crying

00:31:01

and i'm saying come on guys you know i need your support here we you know we need to put strategy together we've

00:31:06

got to put a plan together because that is how that's my mindset my mindset has always

00:31:12

been that way there's got to be a solution to this you know there's got to be something better that can come from

00:31:18

this it was a brutal journey um there is no doubt about that um

00:31:26

but i remember saying things to myself like when i have my next scan the cancer is going to be gone

00:31:33

and when i had my next scan in the january it had gone or

00:31:39

it wasn't on the scan i then had an operation in the

00:31:44

in the july i think it was uh a lumpectomy and i was told i was all clear

00:31:52

and that there was a one 0.1 percent chance it would come back because i'd had such a good

00:31:59

response to treatment unfortunately i was in that 0.1

00:32:05

and it did return a couple of years later and i had a mastectomy

00:32:12

and when i spoke to the consultant he said

00:32:17

it's not curable but it is treatable uh because it's now gone from stage two

00:32:23

to stage four which was you know which was devastating to hear and of

00:32:28

course i i immediately said to him well um you know

00:32:33

what are the chances of it being cured i know you're saying it it's not curable but we've all heard of people oh yes but

00:32:39

you know that's not not point and my attitude is well if anyone's

00:32:44

going to be that 0.1 is going to be me because

00:32:50

i have to think like that that's what helps drive me forward and

00:32:55

get me out of these situations if i could have been that 0.1 where it went wrong i can be that 0.1

00:33:01

where it goes brilliant and actually i'm right now

00:33:06

in what they call excellent remission so you know i'm still got my i still have

00:33:12

ambitions for more but i am feeling blessed at where i am

00:33:18

and i think that has a lot to do with with my outlook on life and that's the learning you know when

00:33:24

nobody wants to wish this you know serious illnesses or life-threatening illnesses on ourselves but

00:33:32

for me i have to find the opportunity in that where's where's the good thing where's the opportunity well it has made me live

00:33:39

a much healthier life you know i do appreciate things so much more you know i am a different person i

00:33:45

put you know my priorities have changed i love the female empowerment side of what i do and i want to invest more time

00:33:51

in that i think this is far more important to me and i think finding your passion is so

00:33:58

so vital whether you are going through health issues or not in everything that you do that bias towards optimism that you

00:34:05

describe like you know it sounds like you could be thrown in any sort of situation and you'd be looking at the as you say like

00:34:12

the 0.1 chance of a positive outcome that's a really really remarkable thing

00:34:18

right and you've you know you've been the ceo of a tremendous company you'll you'll be able to look at your organization and see those people in

00:34:25

your organization that have that same bias to optimism when all goes wrong pandemics show up out of nowhere

00:34:31

they have that bias towards optimism which is we can and you know like it doesn't even matter

00:34:38

if we can't because all we can focus on is we can that's the only choice we have but you've also probably seen the

00:34:43

negative the other side of that right and um i guess my question to you is like

00:34:48

from what you've seen in your organization and you know even in your life how important is that and how costly is the antithesis of that

00:34:58

oh gosh there's a few answers to that first of all in my personal life the first thing that comes to mind is my

00:35:04

daughter so when she was in junior school every morning without fail

00:35:09

as she left i my husband would take her to school and i would say i can and she

00:35:15

would shout back i know i can so we did that every morning and i

00:35:20

didn't want her to grow up having the that feeling of lacking in confidence and

00:35:27

being so painfully shy i just wanted to empower her as much as i possibly can

00:35:33

so it's just that's just a little thing i used to do i think um [Music]

00:35:38

you know the pandemic is a really good example i mean i remember i mean at our

00:35:43

peak we had 146 stores you know over the years obviously more people are going online we've

00:35:50

reduced our our store portfolio and then of course the pandemic

00:35:56

anyone having leases had to uh negotiate with their landlords and you

00:36:01

know we had to suddenly be told that all of your stores i had to be closed i mean i never

00:36:08

i can never forget that moment it was heartbreaking actually because it was like my baby you know to suddenly be

00:36:14

told that was incredible and then of course you you're thinking

00:36:20

how am i gonna tell my teams we value our people so much and this was how we're going to

00:36:27

talk them through what's you know the plan because we had to make difficult decisions we had to let people go

00:36:33

but bringing those people on that really difficult journey was so important

00:36:39

talking to them regularly reassuring them telling them what our plans were how we

00:36:44

were going to get through this um was

00:36:51

it was incredible actually in a yes we all worked really hard everybody

00:36:56

worked so hard but they achieved things i never thought we as a business could achieve i mean

00:37:04

our sales ambassadors you know went from 4 000 to 20 000 in three

00:37:09

months um because we were doing a fantastic job um

00:37:15

i mean you may say differently but i think we were doing a fantastic job on social engaging with our customers and

00:37:22

you know keeping the conversations going and being relevant in what was going on and

00:37:27

you won't be surprised that we completely sold out of penis pasta penis sorry one second

00:37:33

[Music] take a add break there for peanut though

00:37:38

penis pasta of course okay all the supermarkets sold out of pasta and we

00:37:44

were pushing pasta and toilet rolls we were pushing our penis pasta which is pasta shaped

00:37:50

like penis okay we were doing and still are doing some amazing things

00:37:57

it was a very creative time hmm very innovative forced innovation very

00:38:03

creative and innovative quick one on this podcast i've spent a lot of time talking about how huel has

00:38:09

changed my life especially someone that lives a very fast-paced lifestyle that wants to also be healthy and not you

00:38:15

know reach for convenient food having a nutritionally complete um partner in my

00:38:20

life like huell has led me to being in the best shape of my life but also has given me high energy has made me feel

00:38:26

good has helped my mental health however this week i wanted to do something different because every week i bang on about the impact it's had on me i

00:38:32

received a dm from somebody this week um from a young man who picked up um some

00:38:38

huel a couple of months ago after listening to the podcast which makes me feel amazing um and they described to me

00:38:44

how having fueled and having a convenient alternative to the junk food they were

00:38:49

eating has had a tremendous quote tremendous impact on every area of their

00:38:54

lives that they would never have foreseen before um and this person has continued to send

00:39:00

me videos and sometimes pictures of them on their heel journey and their transformation and for me that is why

00:39:05

it's a pleasure to have huel as a sponsor a company and a brand and a product that i genuinely believe can help people change their lives and start

00:39:11

getting nutritionally complete in their dietary choices

00:39:16

you started working at summers when you were 19. i did yes how did that happen so i was working at royal dalton i had

00:39:25

no i had no business experience i had retail experience but

00:39:30

it wasn't you know roald dawn is a fantastic brand but it was too quiet

00:39:37

and i wanted a much buzzier environment they offered me management but i you know it wasn't really what i wanted to

00:39:44

do so i was creative as well so i wanted i guess there was that

00:39:50

creativity um and i

00:39:55

i worked at ann summers which was my father's business at the time and they were he had sex shops and

00:40:02

um a mail order business which was like literally tearing a

00:40:08

coupon out of a magazine and posting off what you wanted i was only working there as for work

00:40:14

experience and i was invited to a tupperware well it wasn't tupperware

00:40:20

it was pippa d but it was sort of like tupperware style party and it was closed

00:40:26

and it was in a council flat in southeast london in thames mead and i remember

00:40:32

driving there in my mustard colored mini um i was just you know just these two women invited me they knew what i did

00:40:39

and i was just a guest um and they were showing around the clothes and and then somebody got

00:40:44

i do remember actually having to draw a picture of my husband's meat and tooth edge on a piece of paper on top of my

00:40:50

head that and i was sort of thinking this is not how i imagined my career starting

00:40:57

but it's uh it's an interesting story and it was women at the party sort of

00:41:02

knew i worked at ann summers and said look why don't you do ann summers parties we want to we'd love to be able to spice up our sex

00:41:09

lives but we're we're too embarrassed to go into a sex shop and i thought actually this is quite a good idea

00:41:16

so i got some of the toys and lingerie from the from our tottenham court road store we had at

00:41:22

the time um i held a few parties myself

00:41:28

and uh and i remember guests at the party sort of passing the product round like this because

00:41:33

obviously it was switched on and they were sort of excited um

00:41:38

curious but incredibly nervous at the same time which now of course they just want to know what sizes they come in

00:41:44

what speeds they are it's completely different but

00:41:49

they were having fun they were enjoying themselves that they were talking about their relationships you know they were

00:41:57

just being open and relaxed and candid and i just thought this

00:42:03

this is something completely different i've never seen anything like this you don't even

00:42:08

women's magazines aren't this candid it was that point i thought if this if i

00:42:13

go forward with this it's going to be for women only you know you're just not going to get that same atmosphere

00:42:20

with with men and also a mixed um group i just thought women would feel uncomfortable

00:42:26

uh there'd be other partners husbands there showing personal product this isn't this isn't going to

00:42:32

work and i think that was actually one of the best decisions i made so of course today it's sort of like a

00:42:38

a female institution but we had at that time there was i think 10

00:42:45

of women going in the stores and i remember taking this idea to the board

00:42:51

walking down this sort of what felt like this long corridor into this room full of all men

00:42:57

all middle-aged all in grey suits um and telling them about this party i'd

00:43:02

been to and these parties that i'd held and you know we we need to do something different

00:43:09

we should do and summer's parties i had no business experience by the way

00:43:14

just all from the heart and i remember one businessman

00:43:20

at the meeting ron coleman he's dead now so i can talk about it he stood up and he threw his pen down on

00:43:25

the table and said well this isn't going to work is it women aren't even interested in sex

00:43:32

so i instantly thought well actually this has got a lot more to do about your sex life than it has about my idea wow

00:43:39

um and you know luckily they agreed to it to invest in some advertising

00:43:45

so um i was advertising in the evening standard

00:43:53

once a week and i wasn't allowed to put erotic parties i had to put exotic and i

00:43:58

couldn't say ladies only because of all the rules

00:44:03

but i used to hold like a seminar once a week at strand palace hotel

00:44:10

and i'd go up there meet with people that had seen the advert probably about 25 people in the room talk to them about my idea

00:44:17

obviously the men i had to ask leave some would actually get up and

00:44:23

leave themselves they you know it was nothing had been done like this before and i remember i still

00:44:29

remember having those conversations and i remember remember one couple it's two women wanted to do the

00:44:36

parties together bored housewives living in chelsea not the demographic people would

00:44:42

necessarily expect and then all of a sudden people were popping up

00:44:47

groups of people were popping up in different areas so i recruited the two girls in chelsea i recruited the eight

00:44:53

women at the party in thames mead then what i would do is i would advertise in those area

00:45:00

areas concentrate the advertising in those areas and it really was self-propagating then later when we

00:45:06

decided to right we're ready now to open stores reopen stores with a through a female

00:45:12

lens it was like a an induction into the brand so um and it still is i think to a degree

00:45:20

it's incredible and something you said at the start there about being naive in business i thought was really compelling

00:45:26

because so much innovation seems to come from being naive

00:45:31

yeah i agree i had no experience but it that no experience forced me to rely on

00:45:36

feedback from my customers you know something we don't always do enough of um

00:45:42

because i had no choice and what i saw as a disadvantage actually turned out to be you know one of

00:45:49

my and the brand's main benefits because that's

00:45:54

in our dna now that's what we do it's really interesting i've never heard a phrase like that that you were

00:46:00

because you didn't have experience or a ton of knowledge you were learning from feedback as opposed to like convention

00:46:08

convention doesn't create new things it's just more of the same yeah and you

00:46:13

know as a woman in business i was only 21 i was

00:46:18

quietly spoken not how people would expect a business person to be alone if you like in the sex industry as

00:46:25

it was then i don't sort of think of it that way now there's so much negativity so from

00:46:31

business people i would have comments um i remember one guy i owned a chain of

00:46:37

estate agents saying to me this isn't going to work it's just a fad give it two years

00:46:43

you know and i think people were so used to doing things how they'd always done them

00:46:51

and we know that don't we when we and i'm moving on a few years and if it's okay to go off-piste again because

00:46:57

you know when you think of heritage brands like wal-was you know doing things the way

00:47:04

they'd always done things that's why i say the pandemic there were positives because it it forced those companies

00:47:11

that have done well to do things differently you talked about the phase in your

00:47:17

business where you started opening these stores um in that era you know if someone was to

00:47:23

open a a shop that was perceived as being just a sex shop

00:47:28

in my neck of the woods you know when there was a huge amount of stigma towards it i can't imagine people being so happy

00:47:35

about that it wasn't the people it wasn't if you weren't if we wanted to go into i mean

00:47:40

i'll give you an example of loads of examples but you know bromley um

00:47:46

we really wanted a presence in in bromley um glade center and i actually remember you know i was i

00:47:53

went with the landlords and the um the center and you know and they were

00:47:59

going right well you know we could do it we could do it if if we change the if you could change the name from ann

00:48:05

summers and there was a a brand bias

00:48:11

there were many you know center management that would say over our dead body and

00:48:16

someone did someone send you a bullet in the post yes what the [ __ ]

00:48:21

why did they send you what uh god i wanted to open a store in dublin

00:48:29

the sales per um per head parties were higher than they were in the uk

00:48:36

so i knew that um you know there were there was an appetite

00:48:43

and we found this site in o'connell street which admittedly was

00:48:50

a bit of a controversial location because it was right opposite the gpo building

00:48:55

um and so you know it's where there were

00:49:00

you know there was violence and clashes and the dublin corporation which is the equivalent of our council in fact they

00:49:06

might be called council now um were ema not emailing me sending me

00:49:12

letters you know putting me under pressure not to go ahead saying that they had another location

00:49:18

backstreet but i didn't want to be in the back street i wanted to be accessible

00:49:24

so they um in fact it was me i invited them over to the uk i just wanted them to see our

00:49:30

stores to see that we weren't trying to shock people that we you know we were trying to empower people we were trying to make

00:49:38

it comfortable for women empower women in the bedroom but despite showing them around and

00:49:45

they they in the after so then during the morning they were shown round by my retail

00:49:51

director in the afternoon i invited them to a board meeting and their names were kieran and alan

00:49:57

kieran couldn't look at me he sat he sat there without any eye contact at all

00:50:03

alan sat right next to me right here telling him every you know they were really good cop bad cop he's trying to

00:50:10

tell me about his sex life and i said to them look you know it's very clear you have your own agenda

00:50:16

you're not going to change your mind there's no not much pointness carrying on here and alan said to me his parting words

00:50:22

were well i hope you'll understand that we cannot be held responsible for what

00:50:28

might happen to you which was a very chilling thing to say

00:50:33

and there was loads of uh negative media because there was all this big

00:50:38

hoo-ha about ann summers um going to o'connell street and

00:50:44

i'd never done any media before and i was uh invited on the late late show which has sort of

00:50:51

got a bit of a cult following yeah and um i was you know really nervous about

00:50:57

going on the show but the producer took me out to dinner and said it's going to be great you know it's

00:51:03

going to be fine you you know gave me lots of reassurance so when i got there uh and i was sat in

00:51:09

the green room michael crawford was on before me and uh for those that don't know he was

00:51:15

a a legend iconic um comedian he i could hear him on stage

00:51:22

you know he was a comedian so he was telling jokes and the audience were laughing and i'm thinking oh my god what's it going to be like when i go on

00:51:29

you know so i went on and i sat on the stage

00:51:34

the presenter had a desk i've sat i was like at the headmistress his office i'm telling you i sat there and all the

00:51:41

audience were uh you know it's a live audience sort of tear-shaped

00:51:47

he didn't interrupt introduction and then he then said right we'll get alan

00:51:52

uh to speak first and i'm like gosh they never told me about this that allen's going to be on the show

00:51:58

alan from council from the council stood up at the front of the stage

00:52:03

and then starts you know beating his chest telling everyone why there shouldn't be an summer store in dublin

00:52:10

and then of course it was my turn and i i just told the story pretty much how i told you about the sales of the parties

00:52:18

first of all one woman at the very back at the highest level stood up and she's pointing down at alan like

00:52:24

this don't you dare tell us where we can and can't shop and it was fabulous because once one

00:52:30

person did it others did it and despite us being served a writ on the first day of opening

00:52:37

um the dublin store is now in our top three performing stores

00:52:43

and it's also on the tourist bus route which you know because of that story which

00:52:49

i think you know for me is great served a writ a writ yeah so we were taken to court

00:52:54

we won the court case we got damages uh because they tried to stop us from

00:52:59

opening and someone sent you a bullet in the post after the show oh sorry yes the bullet in the post that arrived

00:53:08

anonymously obviously a week before i was due to fly out to dublin

00:53:14

and how did that feel um very frightening

00:53:20

but i just felt i've had to deal with a lot of

00:53:27

challenges within the business a lot of preconceived ideas to me i felt like i was being bullied and it

00:53:34

was actually before before bullying was even a thing but that's how i felt and i felt so

00:53:40

strongly about what i wanted to do that nothing was going to stop me and i actually

00:53:47

i did get a somebody a security person to meet me at the airport and you know that was

00:53:53

but that was about it that's what i did you became ceo of ann summers in what

00:53:59

year was that do you remember i don't but i was in my 20s still i think really

00:54:05

becoming a ceo in your 20s is not easy especially if you're going to be

00:54:12

completely honest especially if you're a woman especially in that time in that era when there is so much discrimination

00:54:17

um tell me about because i also became a ceo in my 20s

00:54:22

tell me about the discrimination that a woman ceo

00:54:28

in that era experiences that i would not know about

00:54:33

well there's two as always there's two answers to this question if that's okay the first one is about being

00:54:40

[Music] there were very few business women so

00:54:45

about being a woman in business you know that you'd meet somebody

00:54:51

at a meeting and they would assume that your colleague if they were a man

00:54:56

they would start talking to them so there was that assumption and i think there is a possibility that still goes

00:55:02

on now and actually i as you can tell i'm quite

00:55:08

i'm only five foot one i looked younger than i was at 21.

00:55:14

and well you need 25 now so that's unbelievable so i was only two then and

00:55:21

my managing director was very tall although she was a woman she was very tall

00:55:27

so there is this bias that if you're if you're short and female that you can't possibly be running the business but

00:55:33

then i i still have that now so a few years ago i was speaking i was

00:55:39

doing the keynote speak at the retail live show

00:55:45

and i was i remembered i was interviewing baroness neville rolfe on stage um about her role in in business

00:55:51

and some of the challenges that we were experiencing that the industry was experiencing and i was just walking the

00:55:57

boards basically getting myself comfortable some guy came over and he said i've still got i've still not got my slides

00:56:04

i'm not looking at him he said i'm not in half an hour and i've still not got my i said i'm i'm speaking oh

00:56:11

and then he just walks off and says that's oh [ __ ] you know and and um

00:56:18

another example i've got to tell you this one i jump on the train at the last minute with the first glass ticket i've

00:56:24

been there have you i know exactly you know what i'm gonna say yeah i'm at london bridge all the city boys are sitting in there

00:56:30

the train is full and i just i just come down for sheffield and just managed to get my

00:56:36

um connection i was dressed casual and i said to this guy could could you

00:56:41

move over could you just move over please so i can sit there he said have you got a first class ticket yeah

00:56:48

and i looked at him and i said you're kidding me aren't you you said no if you got a first-class

00:56:54

ticket i said i'm not answering that and so he reluctantly moved over and i sat

00:57:00

down but he then carried on and i'm saying you know this is this is

00:57:06

sexist how many other how many of these city guys sitting in here if you asked

00:57:13

then the guy next to me said who's on the other side of the aisle said just show him your ticket you know we just

00:57:20

start arguing just show him your ticket and the woman in front of me

00:57:25

was doing this i'm like don't calm me down

00:57:32

don't calm me down and that's the problem we need you know that's one of

00:57:38

when people say its job done it is not job done it really isn't job done

00:57:43

those are the rare instances where you get to see it but most of it you don't get to see right most of that discrimination is

00:57:50

invisible because it will be small decisions compounding

00:57:55

against you because of discrimination over decades and decades and decades those are the instances where you can go

00:58:01

hmm that was clear prejudice because that was just me um i read that there was a bullying

00:58:07

culture and summers in the early i heard that for me okay yeah yeah yeah sorry i

00:58:12

thought you meant doing mine no no no no no no but that you um you kind of transformed that

00:58:19

because you didn't like that yes yeah and again that was before bullying was a thing

00:58:25

so we have a parent company called gold group international and that person worked in that part of the business

00:58:32

um and you know and he wasn't the only person there were

00:58:37

others and and bullying was um entertainment

00:58:44

in those days there wasn't the open the open um

00:58:49

culture that we have in businesses today people wouldn't speak up you know they they would assume they're

00:58:54

not going to be listened to or um but i you know i knew it was going on and i thought

00:59:01

this is this is not this is not how i want the business to be so that was that was actually very very

00:59:08

early on and you have a no sort of tolerance approach to that yeah i mean

00:59:14

i just don't i get to hear about you know we're small enough that i get to hear about most things and uh

00:59:22

that's not something i hear about and if if we did we'd be all over it i asked i unschooled my guest this

00:59:28

question you know you've built this tremendous business it's hugely successful and it's really as you said

00:59:33

it's more than just a financial success because it's been a almost like a social success it's been a societal success

00:59:40

because it's kind of led a um perception shift it's dismantled the stigma which i think as you've described

00:59:46

from the atmosphere you describe at these early parties was like liberating for people to be able to be open and um

00:59:54

speak freely about sexuality and sex and which was to be at one point um

01:00:00

but a consequence of my point is the consequence of business success is um financial success

01:00:06

and what role has that played in your in the in your life generally as it relates to your fulfillment and

01:00:13

everything in between financial success i mean obviously financial success is

01:00:18

something you know that as a society i'm not saying as a an individual but as a

01:00:24

society we recognize as you know one of the elements of success

01:00:30

and you know certainly in my younger time that was you know the more

01:00:36

sales the more bottom line all of these things were symbols of success that i recognized

01:00:43

and i i started the female empowerment almost from the day i started but didn't

01:00:48

realize it so or i didn't i realized but i didn't realize the relevance of it or the

01:00:54

importance of it or how groundbreaking it was going to be you know i wanted to create an environment

01:01:01

that was for women i could see why i wanted to do that

01:01:06

and i wanted women to feel safe i wanted them to be open as time has evolved that passion for

01:01:13

doing that has evolved along with so many other things you know

01:01:18

that to me is what gives me the pleasure more than having nice clothes or or whatever you

01:01:25

know just the financial independence that i've given hundreds of thousands of women you know

01:01:30

during lockdown we had women earning thirty thousand we were giving out checks of thirty thousand pounds a month

01:01:36

obviously not to everybody but to our top performers i mean it was like who'd have thought we could be

01:01:42

we would be in a position to do that i mean that's that was fantastic sexual empowerment

01:01:48

for every woman became something that was really important to me in the last 10 years you know uh five

01:01:56

years that's it that's broadened even further to what we consider to be

01:02:03

every woman you know our last campaign for example which i was at a halloween campaign you

01:02:10

know we had trans we had an amputee we had

01:02:16

slim girls we had curve girls we had models we had customers

01:02:21

you know involved in this campaign and that is what every woman is

01:02:27

and that is something i really love so

01:02:33

yeah money is money is nice because we it makes us feel secure um it's it

01:02:40

we're able to treat ourselves we're able to do nice things um you know i feel i've worked really

01:02:45

really hard and you know i feel i'm you know it's nice it's nice to have

01:02:51

nice things and do nice things and i feel very privileged but for me having that legacy which is

01:02:59

far more important to me that for me female empowerment is is what i

01:03:04

stand for and i want to put my stake in the ground and really own it

01:03:10

i was thinking though as you talked a little bit about the pandemic um much the reason why i started this podcast was to highlight um

01:03:17

the more untold parts of like ceos and professional people and successful people's um journeys because

01:03:24

a lot of it's glamorized these days entrepreneurship is seen as quite a very aspirational thing to a younger generation who can create you know

01:03:31

companies using their mobile phone now but what was the um if when i say like the worst day in business

01:03:37

like what's the day that comes to mind for you the hardest day the hardest day was when

01:03:44

the boris johnson announced that all stores would have to close

01:03:50

retail would have to close there was no mention at that stage of

01:03:56

furlough schemes of rates holidays um

01:04:02

you know there was no mention of

01:04:09

deals to be done with landlords or what the future held

01:04:15

i i honestly was in shock that day yeah i can't imagine i can't imagine

01:04:22

that because i don't work in that industry just that the prime minister announcing that you

01:04:27

have to close your business and not offering any kind of hope and i you know and

01:04:33

i went on i mentioned to you earlier i went on the on the on the retail calls

01:04:40

and most companies their their

01:04:48

their level of cash was low i mean most companies based on what we were offered at that time

01:04:54

was you know you you didn't have more than three months cash

01:05:01

so then they of course brought out the sybil's loan but i think it was 80 guarantee

01:05:08

we needed that to be 100 guarantee because there were so many so many um

01:05:15

companies were refused credit um because the banks were so scared so

01:05:22

that was you know you you'd thrown a lifeline and then you know we did this for about

01:05:28

there was about nine months of you know constantly being thrown

01:05:33

lifelines that then didn't materialize or weren't applicable to you

01:05:39

in those um difficult moments um we turned to our partners in life you know they

01:05:45

you know many occasions bear the brunt of that chaos at home

01:05:51

how's your you know talk to me about your home life and how you've met as a ceo of a business that's gone through things like that how you've managed to

01:05:57

maintain a healthy relationship um with your husband

01:06:03

um throughout all of this because i think i need some advice

01:06:08

but you know it's interesting as he was asking the question because and i'm definitely not judging here i'm

01:06:14

just saying that my i mean i i have a wonderful marriage i have a lovely husband but when i was

01:06:20

going through health issues you know let's say you know he wasn't the best

01:06:27

he tried but it's a very very difficult thing to go through and it spurns up a lot of emotions and i

01:06:36

think there were times that he he was brilliant at times that he didn't you know handle things as well

01:06:43

and i'm sure anybody listening would know they've either been in this space or have been in my position can i ask

01:06:50

because i don't want to make that mistake in my life what what what's um what was missing in terms of i think it's the emotional support okay i think

01:06:57

that's what men struggle with um perhaps in those situations

01:07:03

because um i and i think he's so used to me being

01:07:09

strong that's what it is and he said that to me at the time he is so used to me being strong and resilient as you

01:07:14

said earlier and i was strong and resilient but there was a vulnerability about me because obviously i was having

01:07:20

having treatment that was debilitating um you know and i think he struggled with

01:07:26

that i think having you know at one point you know i i couldn't see i couldn't feel my feet

01:07:34

um i was sleeping most of the time obviously struggled with nausea

01:07:40

and i'd lost my hair so that is

01:07:47

you can understand why anybody would find that difficult

01:07:52

but in business when i have business challenges he

01:07:58

you know he's remarkably supportive as many of you know i'm in the process

01:08:03

of making conscious switches in my life and one of the sort of big switches that's happening in my life at the moment is my move towards living a more

01:08:09

sustainable life and that's where a brand like my energy comes in who as you'll know if you've listened to a couple of episodes of this podcast are

01:08:16

one of my amazing sponsors my energy are the uk's number one renewable energy brand and they're on a mission to

01:08:22

increase the usage of green energy this is one of their renewable energy products if you're watching this on

01:08:27

youtube you'll be able to see this but if not um beautiful little thing called the zappy and i've spoken about this

01:08:33

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head over to myenergy.com and check out the zappy on their website to hear a lot more

01:09:05

you talked as well at the very start of this conversation about um the passing of one of your children

01:09:12

um another sort of inconceivable thing to uh experience

01:09:18

you said at the start you've experienced a lot of like misfortune in your life

01:09:23

i mean that's right up there with things that everybody hopes will never happen to them

01:09:29

are you are you comfortable to talk about about that yeah i'm okay

01:09:35

so you you have you had ivf yes tell me about that process i i've

01:09:41

learned you know i've it's it's it's interesting because if it weren't for this podcast

01:09:47

and some of the guests that i've sat here with who've gone through the ivf process and that had the process failed for them

01:09:54

as a young man i would not have a clue about any of that and you know what i

01:09:59

also wouldn't have a clue about the struggles that um some women face

01:10:05

um to become a parent

01:10:10

um so whatever you can tell me about that process and that experience i'd be

01:10:15

incredibly grateful for hmm well obviously it's not just women that

01:10:20

struggle it's men as well which i think can be very difficult for some you know for men i think they find that harder of

01:10:27

course certainly when i went through the ivf i mean it's 12 years over 12 years ago

01:10:33

now so again it wasn't talked about like it is now and that

01:10:39

stigma makes it even more difficult and you know makes everybody involved feel

01:10:45

you know there's something wrong with you and it can be so many different things you know

01:10:51

and it's i don't think it's just a given that people just fall pregnant and the journey i went on is i did three

01:10:58

ivfs in this country everything was if you fall pregnant if

01:11:05

you know if we can make an appointment here if we can do that everything was an if and felt a bit negative

01:11:12

and then i had to um one of the things i had to do was or we had to do as a couple we had to

01:11:18

see a counsellor i think i i don't know if that's still part of the process but you have to see a counsellor

01:11:24

and halfway through the counseling session the counselor started having a go at me

01:11:30

yeah she was saying you're very intense i'm like well i'm just i'm just hanging

01:11:35

you know i'm listening to everything you're saying and i'm interest and she was

01:11:40

it felt like she was threatened by me she felt uncomfortable with me it was just a very negative approach and

01:11:47

then our fourth so we we had a break for about two years and then decided to go again and this

01:11:53

time we went to san francisco and everything was when

01:11:59

when you fall pregnant when this happens oh really yeah we can make this appointment call me anytime

01:12:04

nothing's a problem and i just think we are

01:12:10

maybe things have changed and you know this was i was fortunate to use a private clinic

01:12:15

but there was still this we're very cautious we're so cautious in

01:12:20

in britain but that adds to the anxiety definitely one might even go as far as saying that

01:12:27

reduces the chance of success absolutely we talked about having an optimism bias i'm totally i'm totally convinced of it

01:12:34

totally convinced and the disappointment every time we failed was overwhelming

01:12:40

you know there's this blame like who's who's at fault here you know it is a very difficult it's a very difficult

01:12:47

journey to go on very difficult and the san francisco procedure was successful yes

01:12:54

and i i then found out i was pregnant with twins

01:12:59

which was a shark um i didn't want to know

01:13:05

what sex they were and at my first scan

01:13:13

he just spent a long time on one on one of the babies

01:13:20

i didn't really notice it was my husband that noticed something must be wrong

01:13:26

um and afterwards the radiographer said to us i'm sorry but

01:13:33

one of the one of the fetuses is uh

01:13:39

has a he used words like an abnormal brain um

01:13:47

a morbid outcome and i think i can still pronounce the condition but it the condition

01:13:53

that alfie had was a lobar holland press and kephaly which

01:14:00

is basically he just has enough brain to live

01:14:07

and um to hear that

01:14:14

well in fact i didn't think he was going to make the pregnancy they said he he i

01:14:19

was told he wouldn't make 19 weeks but

01:14:25

um of course he did he he went through to birth and that was very difficult for me because i

01:14:31

had grieved for him when he was in the womb

01:14:36

so it was a big shock to me when he was born and i found bonding with him difficult

01:14:43

at first i found um

01:14:51

diffic i found it difficult going to the hospital um i i was in hospital for a week

01:15:00

um before i was able to go home um i'd had a cesarean it was a two-hour it was

01:15:05

a two-hour journey and i obviously would take scarlet with me

01:15:11

um but that was a very difficult time a very difficult time for me

01:15:17

and he was in hospital for quite some time and then eventually

01:15:26

we had the confidence to move him out of a out of the hospital and into a fantastic

01:15:31

home called the children's trust in tadworth and then i think that was when i was

01:15:38

able to start to build a relationship with him but nothing prepares you for that

01:15:44

nothing prepares you for that

01:15:52

yeah i mean yeah it's just unthinkable and you know

01:15:57

as hard as this is to hear you know he was born in pain and i hear your son

01:16:03

born crying in pain not as a any other you know that was that was just the worst thing on earth

01:16:14

that the impact that has on a relationship as well a marriage

01:16:22

oh god it's just so many there's so many feelings right you know they say

01:16:29

you know it it's ironic that the going through the ivf

01:16:35

probably you know caused arguments and drove us apart but

01:16:42

when we had our son and he was you know obviously

01:16:47

in hospital and then at the children's trust and with this devastating illness

01:16:53

um it pulled us together and my husband i you know was absolutely amazing and i

01:16:59

mean to have a strong person by your side in the worst situation you could ever have

01:17:09

but on the you know we did manage to scarlett was able to spend lots of time

01:17:14

with him we were able to take lots of lovely video footage of him

01:17:20

he was looked after so well there and all of the sensory treatment they they give is amazing and

01:17:28

you know now um we have all of of alfie's memories and

01:17:37

you know i've kept a pirate's box for him and um you know he's very much part of

01:17:43

scarlet's life even though he's not here thank you for your honesty though um i

01:17:50

think it's just tremendously uh valuable and eye-opening and it's a window that into a

01:17:57

a set of life events that few um few are um misfortune enough to

01:18:02

experience but um i'm glad i'm just very uh glad that you find the confidence to

01:18:10

give us that because yeah these are things that you know people are naive to

01:18:16

unless they go through them and i think a lot of the things that you've talked about today um people are naive too unless they go

01:18:22

through them um so sharing it okay like for me is never gonna make me understand fully

01:18:28

but i think it gives me a ton of empathy towards um the people that go through those situations so thank you for that um

01:18:35

something else you mentioned at the start of this conversation was about a nanny and i i wrote that down because it

01:18:41

was a slightly obscure thing to hear but i wanted to come back to it just before we we conclude which was that you

01:18:47

were poisoned by an annie i've been very unlucky haven't i oh yeah yeah um i mean this was bizarre this was

01:18:55

bizarre this is like a movie i had this nanny uh it was when alfie was

01:19:01

uh obviously in the home so i needed all the help i could get and um

01:19:09

i trusted her implicitly with my daughter and

01:19:14

i had a really good relationship with her i liked her she was a lovely girl

01:19:20

and you know very reliable etc i also had

01:19:27

a lady that used to sort of pop in with and do odd jobs and while i was going through that period

01:19:32

without fee she would also prepare our meals so all i had to do uh

01:19:37

before hallow fresh and gusto it's what i had to do to um

01:19:43

you know she'd just make it easier for me and what i didn't know

01:19:49

was that she and the nanny didn't get on and

01:19:56

the nanny instead of coming to me and saying look i've got a problem here can we talk

01:20:01

about it she thought the best tactic would be to get the cook the sack

01:20:10

so she thought i know i'll start off by putting uh

01:20:16

copious amounts of sugar in in in the food after she's prepared it

01:20:22

so i came home from work and i'm sat there and

01:20:29

cooked dinner everything seems fine and we had fish and when we sat down to eat the fish the sauce tasted like

01:20:35

custard um but you know the first time it happens

01:20:41

you think maybe she acts i don't know maybe she's just used the wrong pot yeah

01:20:47

and the second time a few weeks later same thing happened again this time

01:20:52

it was salt and i thought there's something wrong here

01:20:59

um and i want i obviously needed to talk to the

01:21:06

to the lady that was doing the food so that's what i'd arranged to do

01:21:12

but before i had chance to speak to her um

01:21:20

the nanny was taking my daughter to blue water and i'd left my lunch at home

01:21:26

and so i called her i said you wouldn't drop it in for me would you she said yeah no problem i'll do it on the way

01:21:32

so she came over unbeknown to me on the way pulled over

01:21:39

poured um [Music] screen wash into my soup

01:21:45

sealed it all back up again then went to the petrol station sorted herself out petrol for the car she's got my daughter

01:21:51

in the back brings it to my office gets in the lift brings it up gives it

01:21:56

to me as say thanks ali taking it from her then she's gone off to blue water with

01:22:03

scarlet so i didn't know straight away because it wasn't until i'd come to i came to

01:22:09

eat it at um lunch time

01:22:14

luckily i took quite a large mouthful and the reason i say that is because i don't think i

01:22:20

would have tasted it otherwise um and i spat it out because immediately

01:22:26

it tasted of chemical because screenwash can kill you

01:22:31

and um yeah we i then went into

01:22:39

meltdown because obviously she got my daughter with her did you know straight away but she'd done that

01:22:44

i yes i i it was just instinct my instinct

01:22:50

was she it was her but i needed to talk to the cook first

01:22:56

but this all happened too quickly i thought if i ring the police issue of sound mind would you know would that

01:23:03

make things worse so i just waited for her to to because she was due to come back anyway and drop

01:23:10

scarlet off with me and um yeah when she did um i took scarlett

01:23:18

and um my hr um gary at the time and uh someone else

01:23:25

my sister actually i think it was um confronted her

01:23:31

and what did she admitted you joke first of all she denied it but went bright red

01:23:36

and then they said look if you tell us the truth we won't need

01:23:42

to get the police involved so she just blurted it out she said okay i did it i don't i don't like the cook

01:23:50

i don't like the cook and uh of course i then felt i could do nothing

01:23:56

but call the police because this is a woman that is going to even when she leaves even

01:24:03

when she leaves me she's going to get another job doing this where she could do something like this to another family

01:24:09

and and so she was charged it went to court she appeared on

01:24:18

good morning britain first thing in the morning and was at court in the afternoon

01:24:24

which didn't go down with the judge eith well with the judges you can imagine um you know trying to get public

01:24:30

sympathy and and sorry public sympathy yeah i think

01:24:36

you know these people don't always see their own wrongs do they they they

01:24:42

it's never their fault who's what was it and have you um

01:24:49

i think she just she was just trying to put herself across in a in a positive way

01:24:55

um you know she wasn't trying to harm me but

01:25:00

nevertheless she was in a trusted position and you can imagine that the sort of trauma

01:25:07

i felt for those few hours and actually afterwards because

01:25:12

you know you then are questioning whether you can ever trust anybody again um

01:25:18

i'm i just you know it's something else that makes you feel vulnerable

01:25:25

um she you know she kept messaging me trying to get the

01:25:31

the court case cancelled and of course once it goes through that process it can't anyway she was uh found guilty she was

01:25:38

sentenced to um a year in prison and she served three months [ __ ] you

01:25:45

know that is awful

01:25:50

do you know me like potentially killing somebody and um poisoning someone's food

01:25:56

you get three months in prison and then when she came out of prison

01:26:02

i then had to take out an injunction on her because i found out that she

01:26:10

was trying to write a book about that time i mean you know how much more disgusting

01:26:17

can it get what a ride

01:26:24

[Laughter] it's been very colorful

01:26:29

what do you like inclusive life lessons when you reflect on your own journey in

01:26:35

business in life what are some of the like you know the things you'd say to your daughter if you were trying to

01:26:40

advise her on the potential rollercoaster that life can be as it has been for you

01:26:47

i mean i tried i'm somebody who tries to have few regrets because i don't think

01:26:54

there's any great benefit to that but there are things i definitely would have

01:27:00

done differently um i think you know i do have courage

01:27:07

but you can never have enough of it and in certain situations i always find

01:27:13

myself the first one to be daring i suppose is the word i'm looking for

01:27:20

um i think that's a good thing i could think that's a good thing in life i

01:27:26

think being engaging is a good quality i'd want my daughter to have which is why i've always wanted her to

01:27:33

be as confident as possible to always believe that you not only can

01:27:38

you be anything you want to be but you don't have to follow the norm and actually it's good to be different

01:27:44

my business pieces would be slightly different actually because i you know i think the things i wish i'd done more of are

01:27:51

networking um and i i told you about the story about going to

01:27:57

san diego and i guess that's where i was going with that because in america networking is something that people do

01:28:04

all the time and in this country at the time i started out it was nowhere near what it is today

01:28:13

and i think particularly for women women you know i'm you know my husband is a brilliant networker i mean

01:28:20

you know wherever he does it he'll do anywhere and you know i know when he says oh i was playing

01:28:26

golf again actually you know he's um he's just natural at it it's it's part

01:28:32

of who he is but i think you know women it's a thing where you think i haven't got time for

01:28:39

that i've got to really focus on this job or i've got to finish this deadline or but i have realized as i've got older

01:28:46

you know every time you walk in a room and meet a room full of strangers there's an opportunity there

01:28:51

you know that could possibly change your life and actually you were telling me something similar earlier

01:28:57

when you were talking about the apprentice oh right yeah yeah exactly yeah yeah

01:29:03

so you know i've got to basically we were talking about the apprentice before we started recording

01:29:08

and um uh chuckling you were on the the apprentice yeah um

01:29:13

and i was saying that i basically got through off the apprentice the junior apprentice when i was 14 years old as some of you might know

01:29:20

um but in the queue i met a family the alawalia family um it was actually the earth the son of

01:29:26

the alawalia billionaire i believe he's a billionaire now was in the queue with me got chatting tim j alawalia and

01:29:32

although i got kicked off the show and therefore didn't get the 25 grand that i would have got 14 years old to start my business he ended up investing multiples

01:29:40

more than that in my business and that was just someone that i met in the queue and had great conversation with because we were auditioning together for seven

01:29:45

hours so um and i think that's brilliant a brilliant example yeah i completely agree yeah so um

01:29:55

and the people piece that i said to you earlier i wished i had recognized the importance of you

01:30:01

know for me you know people are the success of your business and

01:30:07

i wished i'd recognized that earlier a men to that

01:30:13

that's this that's the single number one thing that i wish i'd recognized earlier i thought it was about me

01:30:20

because i was naive and yeah and probably a bit i don't know arrogant i thought my business success was about my

01:30:25

ability but it was all about the people that i pulled together and the culture i bound

01:30:31

them with so i had an idea last week which we wanted

01:30:36

to try historically we get our guests just to sign the book but um what i would like you to do

01:30:41

instead of that as well as signing the book is just to write a question and whoever sits in this seat next and

01:30:47

it could be anybody right could be someone at the very very top of

01:30:53

business the very top of politics the very top of sports

01:30:58

um could be anybody i'm gonna ask them to i'm gonna ask them that question

01:31:03

we're not gonna we're not gonna read it out right now but next week's episode i will post them that question so whatever

01:31:08

question you wanna write in this book feel free okay there's gonna be a secret until next week's episode okay

01:31:14

thank you so much um thank you you know you're just remarkable it's quite staggering that

01:31:20

you've both gone through so much adversity as you've described and misfortune as you've you've called it

01:31:27

and um yeah you are the person you are today and there's such a huge amount of optimism which shines through when you

01:31:33

speak about these incidents and even you know you're talking about some of some incidents that are just unthinkable for one person to go through in their life

01:31:40

just one of those incidents yeah you always in it with a butt and that was always the silver lining and i think to have

01:31:46

that attitude where you can always see the silver lining or the the lesson or the

01:31:51

value in adversity is a remarkable thing that um i think

01:31:57

you know will will create as we described with the negativity bias that you saw in the ivf system in the uk can

01:32:04

actually dictate the outcome in our lives yeah and the last two years has been you know the greatest need for an

01:32:09

optimism bias i think we've all experienced so thank you you've inspired me tremendously i read about your story

01:32:15

before you came here today and i was just blown away but i was blown away by your success as well as a businesswoman because coming into a company at 19 and

01:32:23

becoming the ceo and leading it as you have and changing the business and then leading this incredible charge against

01:32:29

uh you know a male stigma um but more broadly a

01:32:35

social stigma around sex sexualization and sex and and um

01:32:40

and i guess equality um is just a remarkable remarkable thing

01:32:46

you know and this is the reason why i started this podcast was to get to meet people like you that would inspire me

01:32:51

and i just happened to record it so other people could listen so thank you well it's been a real joy i i i have

01:32:57

really enjoyed it um and i really look forward to hearing it

01:33:02

and seeing it yeah thank you so much honestly amazing yeah thank you

01:33:08

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01:33:16

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foreign [Music]

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Episode Highlights

Jacqueline Gold's Inspiring Journey
Jacqueline Gold shares her remarkable story of resilience and empowerment after facing childhood trauma.
“Her road to success is one of the most devastatingly misfortunate, tragic, heartbreaking roads.”
@ 00m 52s
October 04, 2021
The Impact of Early Adversity
Jacqueline discusses how her challenging childhood shaped her career and drive for independence.
“I didn't want to feel like a victim.”
@ 11m 21s
October 04, 2021
The Power of Courage
Jacqueline emphasizes that courage is essential for building confidence and overcoming challenges.
“Courage comes first, and I've always had a lot of courage.”
@ 21m 04s
October 04, 2021
Empowering Women Through Education
She emphasizes the need for more education on consent, especially for young women.
“I think there's a lot that we don't know, we don't realize.”
@ 28m 36s
October 04, 2021
Resilience in the Face of Adversity
After being diagnosed with breast cancer, she focused on solutions and positivity.
“The battle is won before the war has even started.”
@ 30m 43s
October 04, 2021
Challenging Stigmas in Business
Her journey in the sex industry faced skepticism, but she proved the naysayers wrong.
“I had no business experience, but I relied on feedback from my customers.”
@ 45m 31s
October 04, 2021
Winning Against the Odds
Despite facing a writ on opening day, the Dublin store became a top performer.
“The Dublin store is now in our top three performing stores.”
@ 52m 37s
October 04, 2021
Transforming Workplace Culture
She transformed a bullying culture at Ann Summers, prioritizing a supportive environment.
“I just don't... that's not something I hear about.”
@ 59m 14s
October 04, 2021
The Journey of IVF
Her IVF journey was filled with challenges, stigma, and ultimately, heartbreak.
“It can be so many different things...”
@ 01h 10m 45s
October 04, 2021
Coping with Loss
The experience of losing a child brought unexpected strength to her marriage.
“It pulled us together.”
@ 01h 16m 53s
October 04, 2021
A Shocking Betrayal
A nanny poisons a father's food, leading to a police investigation.
“She poured screen wash into my soup.”
@ 01h 21m 39s
October 04, 2021
Life Lessons from Adversity
Reflecting on challenges faced, the speaker emphasizes the importance of courage and networking.
“You can always see the silver lining in adversity.”
@ 01h 31m 46s
October 04, 2021

Episode Quotes

I didn't want to feel like a victim.
Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE
Courage comes first, and I've always had a lot of courage.
Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE
I just wanted to empower her as much as I possibly can.
Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE
Nothing was going to stop me.
Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE
Money is nice, but having that legacy is far more important.
Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE
You know, how much more disgusting can it get?
Ann Summers CEO: The Heartbreaking Story Of One Of Britain's Richest Women! Jacqueline Gold CBE

Key Moments

Courage and Resilience21:04
Empowering the Next Generation35:20
Court Case Victory52:54
CEO Challenges54:05
Discrimination in Business54:17
IVF Journey1:09:41
Nanny Incident1:21:39
Court Case1:24:09

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