-
- How do I take care of my customer?
-
And that wins. We have
a business in Omaha,
-
some of you may have heard of.
-
It's the largest home
furnishing store in the world
-
in Omaha, which only has
A-S-M-S-A of 650,000 people.
-
It's on 72 acres.
-
It's does $325 million in one location,
-
which happens to be $500
for every man, woman,
-
and child in the SMSA.
-
But it draws from beyond that.
-
That business comes about,
-
or has resulted from an investment
-
of $500 in 1937 by a woman
-
who walked out of Russia in 1921.
-
She landed, she walked
out, got on a peanut boat,
-
landed in Seattle with
a tag around her neck.
-
She couldn't speak one word of English.
-
The American Red Cross looked at the tag
-
and said, Fort Dodge, Iowa,
-
they got her to Fort Dodge, Iowa.
-
She couldn't pick up the
language. She was there two years.
-
She said she felt like a dummy.
-
So she came to Oma because
there were other Russian Jews
-
there, and she'd at least
have somebody to talk to.
-
Her little girl started school.
-
Francis Francis would come home at night
-
and teach her mother the word
-
she learned in school that day.
-
That's how this woman Rose Lumkin,
-
learned the English language.
-
But from her, from her
daughter, from kindergarten on,
-
teaching her the words,
-
she brought seven siblings over
from Russia, one at a time,
-
50 bucks every time she
saved 50 bucks, she sold,
-
used clothing and the works.
-
She, she, she got her seven siblings
-
over her mother and father.
-
And by 19 37, 16 years after
she got here, she saved $500.
-
She got on a train, went to Chicago,
-
to the American Furniture Mart,
-
which was this huge, impressive thing.
-
And she had this, she was smart as hell,
-
but she thought like a peasant in a way.
-
And she saw this building and she decided
-
to name her company, the
Nebraska Furniture Mart.
-
She went in and bought $500 worth of,
-
she bought about $2,000
worth of merchandise
-
all the way back to Omaha.
-
She worried because she
thought I owe $1,500
-
and she only had a $500 equity.
-
So she got to Omaha.
-
She took the bed, the
sofa, the refrigerator out
-
of her own home to sell fast
so she could get the money
-
so she could pay on time.
-
She took that business and billed it.
-
From that start, no one would sell to her.
-
She went into court four times
-
because they tried to, the
carpet manufacturers tried
-
to keep her from selling at a discount.
-
And she went into court
and told the judge,
-
'cause she figured out ways
to buy this stuff in various
-
nefarious ways from other, had
other people buy it for her.
-
And she said, look at, I pay
$3 a yard for this carpet.
-
Brandeis sells it for 6 98.
She says, I sell it for 3 98.
-
Just tell me Judge, how much
you want me to rob people.
-
She defended herself. Papers wrote it up.
-
The judge bought carpet
from her the next day.
-
I mean, it was, it was marvelous.
-
Brandeis isn't selling anymore.
-
They were the huge
department store in almost.
-
She put everybody out of business.
-
And the punchline, she worked till
-
- She was 103.
-
She sold me the business when she was 89
-
and she didn't have, she
didn't have an audit.
-
I went out to see her one afternoon.
-
I took a check out with me and
-
because I knew she wanted to
do something and I said, Mrs.
-
B, here's the money. I
said, I don't need an audit.
-
Just tell me whether you owe any money.
-
She says, I've never owed any
money since I owed those guys
-
back in 1937.
-
And she said, it's all free and clear.
-
She'd never seen a balance sheet.
-
She didn't know what
accounting terms meant,
-
but she understood the
nature of the business.
-
And I told her, I said, I'd rather have,
-
I'd rather have your word, you know,
-
than an audit from every one
-
of the Big six or big eight or whatever.
-
There were the number at the
time of the top auditing firms.
-
And, and she worked till she
was 103. She died at 104.
-
She had three siblings at her funeral.
-
I mean, those are some genes.
Her son works there now.
-
He's 82 or three, and the
three sisters are all alive.
-
But the punchline is she
couldn't read or write.
-
This woman could not read
-
or write if you told her
this room was 68 feet by 43,
-
she would tell you how many
square yards it was like that.
-
She never went to school
a day in her life.
-
She would tell you how, how
much that was at 5 90, 80 yards.
-
She'd add the tax she'd knock off
-
something 'cause she liked your looks.
-
And that would be it.
-
And that, that's, you
know, that is the, the,
-
that you can't beat that.
-
You know, and, and you can't replicate
-
that at General Motors.
-
You can't institutionalize that.
-
The, the person who brings that
kind of drive to a business
-
and does it day after day and
thinks about their customer,
-
and that's all she did, can't, well,
-
she raised four kids in the process too.
-
But you can't, it, it can't miss.
-
And no, you don't have to
worry if you're an entrepreneur
-
in most fields, there's some
fields where you can't do it
-
because there are scale aspects to it.
-
But in most fields, you know,
you'll, you'll kill people.
-
Bob Shaw did that was was Shaw.
-
Nobody ever heard of Shaw
in carpet 30 years ago
-
and he's got 40% of the carpet
business in the country.
-
So don't I, it it's a great
field of opportunity out there
-
and I, I dunno about
trucking specifically,
-
but I wish you the best on it then.
-
You're, you won't be at a
disadvantage in many fields if,
-
if you're small and you'll
actually have an advantage.
