Outside the box
Brendan Lindsay has been bombarded with requests for money in the year since he sold his plastic container business for $660 million, writes Madison Reidy.
Retired businessman Brendan Lindsay has millions to donate, but he won’t fund any business that isn’t based in New Zealand.
It has been one year since Lindsay sold his plastic storage container company Sistema to United States conglomerate Newell Brands for $660 million.
At the time, he said he would make a difference to people’s lives.
Since then he had bought Sir Patrick Hogan’s Cambridge Stud and half of hive and honey business Coast to Coast Bees for undisclosed sums.
Lindsay expected to be bored after selling the multimilliondollar plastics business he started in his garage in Cambridge, but he was far from it.
He had bought more horses for the stud and was racing some in Europe next week. He planned to double the number of Coast to Coast’s hives to 10,000.
He had signed a three-year funding deal to keep the New Zealand Riding for the Disabled charity afloat, and had donated some of his fortune to Blind Foundation Guide Dogs too.
Any organisation involving animals was a cause worth funding, he said.
‘‘I like to help people who really can’t help themselves. Those animals don’t have the help, they need people like us to fund them.’’
But he was sick of hearing from businesses who wanted his investment or involvement.
‘‘The door knob has been worn down. A lot of people want me to invest in all sorts of things, but you know what, somebody’s ideas – it’s sometimes just not for us.
‘‘I’ve run my race, it’s up to other people to run theirs.’’
He was not interested in funding any organisation that was not New Zealand-based.
Neither did he care for sitting at a company board table again.
‘‘I look for something that is really quite simple and doesn’t take a lot of stress.’’
Lindsay was not one for the spotlight. He had gone to ground since Sistema’s sale was announced, popping his head out only once last year to note the stud purchase.
However, he spoke to an audience of about 700 people at a business event in Auckland and addressed manufacturers at a University of Auckland conference this week.
Shedding some light on his success, Lindsay said Sistema almost failed twice – once in the 1987 stockmarket crash and again in the 2008 global financial crisis. Two banks tried to sell his assets in foreclosure and he had to borrow from family and friends.
‘‘Never overexpose yourself to a risk that you cannot afford. When you get in that position, it is not good.’’
His predicament taught him to take ownership of his mistakes and not to be a ‘‘weak s..t’’.
Those values served him well in the sale process to Newell.
Lindsay refused to sign over his company to the US firm without a clause in the purchase agreement that allowed his first employee to work for Sistema until she retired.
He told her she would have a job with Sistema for life and he refused to go back on his word.
‘‘When you’re dealing with 50 lawyers … They don’t understand what it means to keep your word.’’
‘‘I’ve run my race, it’s up to other people to run theirs.’’ Sistema founder Brendan Lindsay