Page 103 - James Caan - The Real Deal

9 · Open for Business

that’s what I did, and in some respects it was also who I was. But
by now there was something in me that was eager for a challenge,
eager to fulfil that childhood ambition to run my own business.
After a big discussion with Aisha, we decided it was the right time
to open another shop and that I should quit.
When I handed in my resignation, Tom thought I had complete-
ly lost the plot. He thought it was all about young love and not
profit and he tried quite hard to talk me out of it. But I could see
that Reid Trevena had grown so big and the momentum was
starting to falter as profits fell and overheads didn’t. Maybe if Reid
Trevena had been flying Tom might have been able to talk me
round, but I was so motivated at the thought of making a success
of the business that I doubt it.
We opened a second shop inside the Wood Green shopping
centre, and this one specialised in leather. It was exactly the kind
of shop my dad had talked about us opening together all those
years before. When we spoke each week on the phone I never had
the heart to tell him that it was more profitable than the first shop.
With the second shop, we were able to learn from all the
mistakes we’d made with the first. For starters, we had the
confidence to negotiate a better deal on the lease, and then we
sought much better terms with our suppliers. With the first shop
we had gone to the fashion shows, ordered ranges and paid
upfront for them, but with the new shop we knew to buy stock on
a ‘sale or return’ basis. We couldn’t always buy on those terms,
but when we could it was a huge help to our cash flow because in
many cases we didn’t have to pay for the goods until we had sold
them.
It also helped that I really understood leather. I knew the
material, I knew how to judge the quality and I was able to
establish really good relationships with the manufacturers. If a
celebrity was seen wearing a particular coat, I could get copies
made and in the shop within a fortnight.

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