Don’t forget the brollie!

I can’t believe how hot it’s been lately, but I must admit it’s been great to get out onto the water at weekends and catch a few fish without having to worry about a storm moving in.

And the same applies to business confidence, with lots of sunshine, and a big “feel good” attitude all round.

However, that doesn’t mean you can rest on your laurels and expect business will still keep coming in without you doing anything about it. As with the weather, there’s always a rain storm just around the corner in business, so it’s best to make sure you have a raincoat, or at least an umbrella, handy to ensure you don’t get soaked and maybe catch a chill.

A very successful oil company marketer and later managing director once told me that he increased his advertising spend when things were going well and everybody else was cutting back because they said “we’ve got lots of business and don’t need to advertise”. And he upped it even more when times started to get a bit tough.

That way he said his product was always top of mind no matter what the business “weather”, and the sales kept coming in through thick and thin. And that meant his advertising spend was justified because he had the sales income to back it up.

Makes a lot of sense to me!

Motor sport

On a different note, I’d like to welcome Ross MacKay on board as our resident motor sport reporter. Ross has been a long-time contributor to motor sport writing in New Zealand, and his interests are quite wide and varied. His intention, he tells me, is to ensure as many branches of the sport as possible are covered, from bikes through cars and even 4x4s.

His first big story is an exclusive interview with circuit owner Tony Quinn, and it’s so good we’ve made it our cover story. See p42.