Transcript

I’m Robin Howard. I’m directly responsible for menswear and childrenswear at Boden. Boden is a direct mail company based in London, and we sell clothing around the world, basically. Our main markets are America and the UK.

What I cover and the bits that I enjoy the most I suppose are what I would call the creative side, the idea of creating things, be it clothing or whatever. Even down to a colour palette, choosing colours, I find, I’ve always found really quite exciting. I like that vitality. That’s the thing that’s kept me alive, I suppose, for 50 odd years.

I think I was always creative, I was quite very artistic. I could draw. I followed in my mother’s footsteps and I did art for O-level, certainly. And I was always sketching, drawing things, cars or hands. I used to draw my hands all the time. I don’t know why. But I never really understood it. I didn’t think of it of something I could use in a career. It was just something that I enjoyed.

I did flounder, actually. I didn’t know what to do when I left school. I had no idea. And in fact, when I did leave school eventually I didn’t go to university because I felt I wanted to get out there and get on. I actually worked as a builder, as a plasterer’s mate and did bricklaying and plastering and all sorts of stuff for about six to nine months, which I really enjoyed. Because it was kind of creating something. I suppose that was pushing me in that direction.

And my father was an accountant and he said, well if you can’t decide on anything else to do go and be an accountant. So I went to Poly and I went for a term and failed the exam, thank god, by one point. And so they kicked me out, which I was very pleased about. Because my father had forced me, in a sense, press ganged me into going to do it. In failing I walked out of that door feeling pretty good, actually. And if I’d gone down that route it would’ve been a hideous disaster.

From that point I kind of felt I should go into retailing. I don’t know why. Something just told me that that’s what I should do. Harrods, bless them. There was a woman there who I met, she was the personnel director who interviewed me first time round. And she kind of took a shine to me in the nicest possible way. And she, in fact, became my first mentor. And she made me work on the shop – well, I worked as a stockroom boy, basically. You know, sweeping the floors and putting stock away down in the dungeons of Harrods’ building in London.

Then I became what they call an executive trainee there. So I kind of fell into that quite by luck. But the thing that got me going was this woman.

My wife, I have to bring her into it. Again, it probably sounds a bit twee, but we live on the Isle of Wight, this company is based in London. For 10 years I’ve spent five days a week in London and the weekend at home. I could never have done that without that trust. And she understands that I really, really enjoy this job. And actually, what’s the point in getting in the way of that?

My highest point in my career, which sounds really corny, is working here at Boden. Because what I’ve been able to do here over the last 10 years is pull all the kind of experience that I’ve had around the world – because I’ve worked in various countries – together, and help build this business. So I’m sitting on the top of the most satisfying thing I’ve ever done. And I absolutely love it.