Quotes from Gerry Harvey

What I think is that we should be helping people so they can reach an even greater potential.

Kids go to school; we develop them at school. We develop them later on in the workplace so that we get better quality individuals, so that we get less people that are dependent or get into problems.

I get a lot of comments from people that I'm just an ordinary bloke. They immediately feel they have a closer relationship with you; they relate to you.

I'm hoping there'll be, if not a boom, then a big pick-up in housing because if that happens, then it will employ a lot of people, and the domino effect will go through the community, and it will help everyone.

Importantly, I still give money to homeless people - and all other charities.

The internet thing is what I have the greatest problem with. I don't know if anyone in the media gets the internet thing and Harvey Norman. I think they have some strange interpretation of it that bears no resemblance to what actually happens.

At the end of the day, the more quality individuals you develop in the community, the better off the community should be.

I had a trial run with Norman Ross for 21 years, from '61 to '82. I didn't have it in mind to open a chain like Harvey Norman. I opened one shop, but then the next thing you know, I've got another shop and then another shop.

There are plenty of people smarter than you by a long way. I just got lucky.

You get that air of satisfaction from achievement. It makes you feel good. We are only here for a very short time, and so you're crazy if you don't go out and try to milk it to the greatest extent you can.

There is no Internet business in furniture or bedding. Zero - practically in the world.

I'm probably not your typical business person in many ways. I don't wear a suit. I don't carry a briefcase. I don't wear a tie. I'm fairly casual. I haven't got a big office, and it's in a very ordinary part of town. I'd much prefer to downplay than impress.

I try to develop others. I get a great deal of joy out of helping people who, over the years, I've spent a lot of time mentoring - and just trying to get them to another level.

Everybody, be they female, whatever your religion, whatever your nationality, you're an individual, and if you perform well, we want you, and if you don't, we don't.

That's not in my nature to run away - I'll stand up and fight.

You've got to open on a Sunday, but at the end of the day, you've just lost a lot of money by opening on the Sunday, so it's very, very difficult to make money when you're paying unskilled people $42 per hour.

I'm a great believer in governments doing as little as possible and people power doing the rest, so I'm in favour of governments being there to govern in the areas that need governing, not a whole heap of other things that they stick their sticky fingers into.

For me, anyone who is over 80, I generally sit down and have a chat to because he is over 80, and he is going OK.

Making decisions quickly isn't for everyone, and I've had my disasters, but overall, it works for me.

The people I know who have retired, so many of them lose interest and die; they just become nobodies overnight.