dave lewis column art one use

Well, well, that year just flew by. And what a year! I did send an invitation to all of the living former CEOs who aren’t currently under police investigation to come in for a little drinkie to mark my achievements, but apparently MacLaurin doesn’t get out of the bath chair much these days and all Leahy did was to send a note saying he’d come if I could just let him know what those achievements were.

So here we go.

Erm.

Well, there are quite a lot of numbers bigger than they were this time a year ago, and while these don’t include sales or profits or margins they certainly do include some quite impressive provisions for accounting oversights, executives spending more time with their redundancy cheques and real estate opportunities for investors in the thriving cavernous hangar six miles out of town in a market near you.

Then there’s the share price. If you’re a glass-half-empty sort of person you might say that chopping £2.5bn off the market capitalisation was a bad thing for shareholders, but I see it as a massive investment opportunity. Just imagine if we could get back to the 2009 highs under, er, well, Leahy! And of course, we have a strong plan to do just that, by selling off all those funny international businesses and investing in growth areas like the new Iron Maiden LP on vinyl, and nicer ladies inside our self-service checkouts.

So while I’m not expecting a big gathering here at Welwyn I’m sure everyone (well, Leahy if he turns up) will be happy to drink to the year ahead. If it’s as successful as the year gone by, then it wouldn’t surprise me if the chairman will want a congratulatory word as well.