A person's work should not only be profitable for himself, but also useful for his fellow man.

Otherwise it is just stupidity and vanity.

(F.T. Barnum)

When President Lincoln and his family hosted General Tom Tamm and his wife at the White House during the Civil War, a tired and sad-eyed Lincoln during the conversation asked Tom what he would suggest regarding the conduct of further military operations.

“My President,” Tom replied, “my friend Barnum can resolve this situation in one month.”

Such an opportunity F.T. Barnum was never given, but this answer clearly reflects how highly Americans valued the man's talent and creativity. And we should think: really, what would Barnum do to end the Civil War in his country?

And how would he behave in our tough business environment, where some sharks greedily devour others, trying to quickly stand out from competitors and make potential clients notice themselves? What keys to success would this person identify and use—keys that you could use to emerge victorious in the costly battle of attracting and retaining customers in a time when most people rightfully view business as a battlefield?

As already mentioned, I have identified 10 main factors for the success of Barnum the businessman. And since many people associate his name with the famous three-ring circus, I decided to call them Barnum's "Arenas of Power." Briefly they can be presented as follows.

1. Barnum believed that every minute a new buyer is born in the world. This man simply did not know how to think in small categories. Thus, the American Museum, one of his three main creations, was incredibly popular: over the years of the creator’s life, more than four million people visited it. However, staying in New York, at a price of 25 cents per ticket (50% discount for children), Barnum would hardly have become rich thanks to the museum. His target was not just one market segment. He went on a tour around the world. And he conquered it. He took General Tom Tam to Europe several times, and, on the contrary, brought Jeannie Lind from there to America, both artists traveling by ship (and in the 1980s this took at least two weeks). In the mid-19th century, Barnum was one of the most famous - and richest - people on the planet. Why? Because it was not limited to nearby markets; Even the relatively large city in which he lived was not enough for him. His goal was the planet! One of the chapters explains how you can expand your customer base; In this chapter, you'll also learn new ways to reach potential customers quickly, easily, and inexpensively.

2. Barnum believed in arousing public interest in any way possible. He tried to attract people's attention in every way that could come to his mind. In all likelihood, he can rightfully be called the father of the advertising gimmick. One day he even bought an elephant and forced it to plow the field on his estate. For what? And then, that the field was located near the railroad along which trains traveled to New York. And although most businessmen saw the passengers sitting in the cars as ordinary people, Barnum saw them as potential clients. He knew that the elephant would attract everyone's attention and would be a great publicity stunt. And it worked. Barnum was talked about all over the country, and agrarian societies were keenly interested in where they could buy an elephant for agricultural work. “Newspaper reporters came to me from all over the country and wrote reams of enthusiastic articles about the productivity of the elephant as an agricultural 'tool,'” Barnum wrote. “Before I thought my advertisement had attracted enough media attention, the field had been plowed by an elephant no less than sixty times...” I’ll tell many more stories later about how to generate public interest, as well as new ways to use proven techniques in today’s modern world. business.

3. Barnum believed that people should be given as much as possible for their money. All his life he tirelessly tried to find something that could give people true pleasure. He wanted people to be happy to give him their money. He traveled all over the world in search of artists and things of interest to the public. General Tom Tam, Jenny Lind, Siamese twins (albeit dubious artifacts) - all this was really entertaining and attractive to people. The public wanted what Barnum offered them - unusual entertainment. He used extraordinary, sometimes absurd, publicity stunts to attract everyone's attention to his shows, but when he managed to lure people through the doors of his museums, theaters and circuses, he fully satisfied their desires, never disappointing their expectations. According to researchers, complaints about his shows and performances were extremely rare, although he was a big fan of practical jokes. He turned unkempt, disreputable circuses and then-uninteresting museums into the most popular places for entertainment and recreation. After reading the chapter “Barnum Knew What People Would Give Their Last Cent for,” you will learn what all people strive for, what they are willing to pay their last cent for, and how you can give it to them no matter what business you are in.

4. Barnum firmly believed in the power of the media. Barnum was incredibly creative in promoting himself and popularizing his businesses. An internationally recognized showman, speaker, politician, writer, philanthropist and marketing genius, he gained worldwide fame and became an incredibly wealthy man primarily due to the fact that he knew how (and managed) to make friends with the media. In his last surviving letter, five days before his death (Barnum died in 1891), he writes: “I am indebted to the American press for every dollar I have.” The chapter “Making the Unknown Known and Getting Rich Doing It” reveals the ingenious methods Barnum used to get the media to advertise his businesses—techniques that can still help any businessman gain an edge over the competition today.

5. Barnum relied entirely on persistent, long-term advertising. Although F.T. Barnum believed in the power of free advertising, and he never forgot about the power of paid advertising. He actively used posters, advertisements, classified and display advertising, prospectuses, leaflets and booklets - with their help he advertised what he wanted to sell. Barnum believed in the power of advertising with an almost evangelical passion (see figure on page 37). He was even called the “Shakespeare of advertising.” He wrote: “If you have something that, from your point of view, can interest consumers, something that, if you offer them, will make them want to fork out money, be sure to make sure that they know about it.” In "How to Create Success As Big as an African Elephant," I'll discuss Barnum's surprisingly little-known rules for creating advertising that gets results.

Letter written by F.T. Barnum to President Abraham Lincoln in 1861. Please note that Barnum used every opportunity to advertise his business, even office supplies. (From the author's private collection)

6. Barnum believed that people help each other achieve the results they want. Networking(or networking) is considered a newfangled term in the modern business world, but Barnum practiced this technique more than a hundred years ago. So, having decided that upon his arrival in London he needed to meet with the Queen of Great Britain, he asked for a recommendation from the famous and respected American politician and journalist Horace Greeley. A shining example of networking. And when Barnum needed to “show up” in a particular region, he turned for help to one of the local influential people, even the President of the United States. He knew that most people liked to help others, as long as they were given a really good reason. He was an extremely pleasant and likable person and was liked by everyone. When the great entrepreneur was negotiating the purchase of what would eventually become the famous Barnum Museum of America, and the former owner asked him for a recommendation, the buyer's reviews were so enthusiastic that the owner of the museum initially even decided that it was a fake. It should not be forgotten that Barnum always treated people fairly and was honest with them, which made communication very easy; people were happy to do him the favors he asked for. In the chapter “How the unknown F.T. Barnum met Queen Victoria - and became rich" tells how you can use the arena of power to make any of your contemporaries your partner and assistant.

7. Barnum believed in creative negotiations and treated his employees and artists with respect. Working conditions at F.T. Barnum were always fair. The employees adored him. He paid a good salary, shared profits with people; thanks to him, many of his artists - Jenny Lind, General Tom Tam, the Siamese twins, Admiral Nutt - became very rich people. When the famous Siamese twins Chang and Yeung, having lost their fortunes during the Civil War, agreed to show themselves to the public for money, Barnum divided all income equally, and the artists made good money. Black midget William Henry Johnson, who worked in the show business for more than six decades, F.T. Barnum generally made him his full partner. And when the famous American Mormon religious leader Brigham Young jokingly asked Barnum how much he would pay him for a show featuring himself and his many wives (and he had more than 50 of them), the entrepreneur answered with complete seriousness that he would give him not less than half the proceeds from ticket sales, which he estimated would have been about $200,000 F.T. Barnum always negotiated with absolute integrity. In How Barnum Owned His Dream Business Without Paying a Cent, you'll learn about his savvy deal-making approach that you can use right now to achieve greater success in your business.

8. Barnum believed in a higher power. It is known that Mark Twain suffered several serious failures in his life, including bankruptcy and real family tragedy, and this left a deep scar on his soul for life, turning him into a gloomy cynic with a pen “warmed up in hell.” Barnum also suffered a lot and experienced the same sorrows and troubles, and even much greater ones, but the misfortunes did not harden his soul. The American Museum, his favorite creation, burned twice. His famous Iranistan Palace, the largest and most extraordinary of America's palaces, also burned to the ground. He lost his wife and two daughters. But he never showed his feelings in public. He quickly got to his feet, gave orders for the construction of new houses, museums and palaces, and even married a second time to a woman forty years younger than him. Barnum's enormous inner strength was a consequence of his unshakable belief that everything that happens to us in life is for the better. The laconic inscription on his tombstone reads: “Thy will be done, not mine.” Faith helped him face adversity with honor and prosper in business, despite all the failures and troubles. In the chapter “How to Survive Financial Disasters and Personal Tragedies,” I will talk about the incredible feelings I experienced at the grave of F.T. Barnum, as well as how business becomes part of a person’s personal development, allows him to better understand himself and gives him strength to survive the greatest misfortunes in life.

9. Barnum believed in the power of the written word. Barnum's second (after the Museum) favorite creation was his autobiography, which he wrote and rewrote until his last days. It was finally completed by Barnum's second wife, adding a chapter about the funeral of this great man after his death. Barnum began his literary career at the age of twenty-two, becoming the editor of a religious newspaper, for which he was soon arrested by the authorities. He perfectly understood the enormous power of the printed word in shaping public opinion and used this powerful weapon throughout his life - both when he wrote letters to American presidents, and when he edited newspaper articles, and when he prepared booklets advertising the “mermaid from the Fiji Islands” or his favorite General Tom Tam. He did not let go of the pen until his last days, because he knew that every word he wrote brought him closer to fame, wealth and immortality. One of the chapters explains why today many successful businessmen become authors of articles and books and what you need to do in order to write a book too.

10. Barnum believed in the power of the spoken word. Barnum was not afraid to perform in front of large audiences and did so constantly, advocating for a sober lifestyle or for the emancipation of slaves, to convince people that his shows were moral, highly cultured and safe for children and animals, etc. He knew what the word capable of moving mountains, and tried to communicate more with the brilliant speakers of his time. Barnum performed during the peak years of the popularity of Mark Twain and Charles Dickens and was no less famous than his great contemporaries. He knew that public speaking helps to popularize and, therefore, develop and expand business. Even in his political career—although it provided him with the opportunity to be of great benefit to his third favorite child, the city of Bridgeport—Barnum engaged in what he called “profitable philanthropy.” He knew that through public speaking he would become more famous and attract more people's attention to his business endeavors. In the chapter “How F.T. Barnum went bankrupt. to get rich again” describes unique techniques that will help you become a more convincing and charismatic speaker.

There are many more chapters in this book full of surprises and discoveries, from which you will learn about the keys to success used by F.T. Barnum.

The great showman himself often told people about what, in his opinion, was his main business secret; He gave his famous lecture entitled “The Art of Making Money” hundreds of times. Many subsequently admitted that this performance radically changed their lives. And at least one man, the father of Barnum's second wife, claimed he became rich thanks to his son-in-law's advice. And so that you get a complete picture of F.T. Barnum and his views on what to do to succeed in business, I included the text of this speech in my book.

You may have already begun to wonder how you will put Barnum's arenas of power into practice. It should be said that most modern businessmen limit themselves to only one or two, or at most three of them. And if you use all ten, then you definitely cannot avoid resounding, stunning success. But how to do this? In the following chapters we will look at all 10 arenas of power in detail.

And to let your imagination run wild, I suggest you first listen to F.T. Barnum...

You are determined to become an oil tycoon. Let's say that you are even 100% sure that that puddle behind the cabbage beds is oil, and not a hole in your neighbor's sewer pipe. Where to start developing your own deposit?

Intelligence

You'll need a friend. It is advisable that he be a geologist and know how to handle a seismograph and sticks of dynamite. Underground, oil accumulates in pockets surrounded by a wall of impenetrable rock. Your task is to find these “traps”.

Drilling

In Russia, oil is hidden not under warm sand, but under swamps and hard rock. Before drilling a well, you will have to get rid of the beds and trees, drain the puddles and fill the garden with sand. It is necessary to drill not vertically downwards, but at an angle, in order to cover the deposits under all the neighboring gardens.

You will definitely need a drilling rig - just be careful, it can weigh up to 1000 tons! Taking a pan from the kitchen, prepare a drilling mud: add a couple of reagents and additives to the water. Without a solution, the drill will hit hard rocks and overheat.

Choose the drilling depth depending on the terrain. In Western Siberia, the well goes down 1.5-2.5 km, in Eastern Siberia about 2-3 km, and in the Volga region - 4.5 km.

Production

At this point, your pumping unit will be your best friend. It may be necessary to drill another injection well. Through it, compressed gas is supplied to the pocket, which displaces the oil and even causes it to gush out.

Know that the extracted liquid will only contain about 30% oil - the rest is water and impurities. In addition, you will need somewhere to put the associated gas dissolved in the oil. The easiest way to get rid of it is with the help of the famous “torch”.

Recycling

Crude oil cannot be used - before that it must be distilled. No, your grandfather’s moonshine still will not help you with this. You will need a special structure - a distillation column. It separates oil into gasoline, naphtha, kerosene, gas oil and fuel oil.

Oil will produce gasoline and aromatic hydrocarbons, which are needed for the production of plastic, varnishes, medicines, TNT and other substances. Kerosene and gas oils need to be cleaned. Having classified kerosene according to its properties into aviation, tractor and lighting, it can be used for its intended purpose. Gas oil is one of the most important components of diesel fuel. Fuel oil is used for heating, motor fuel and the production of building materials - tar and bitumen.

Transportation

Here you have to make a choice: you can build an oil pipeline, you can send oil along the river, turning an inflatable boat into a tanker, or you can transport oil in tanks. The choice of method depends on who and where you decide to sell your precious hydrocarbons. To avoid competition, check out the diagram of an existing Russian oil pipeline.

Price

According to the Rosneft company, the cost of one barrel of oil is $35 (including transportation). For a small family business, the cost of production will be even higher. In total, Russia produces about 500 million tons of oil per year.

Of course, the chance of finding oil in your own garden is very small - to do this you need to build a dacha somewhere in the middle of the Siberian swamps. But still, grandma will be grateful to you for digging up the beds.

Photo: thinkstockphotos.com, flickr.com

Women's Best is an Austrian company that sells vitamins, dietary supplements and clothing for women. Its annual income of $10 million is provided by 150 million customers around the world. The company's CEO and co-founder Lukas Kurzmann told TheNextWeb how Instagram is helping him build a business empire.

Focus on customers

The first thing any company should think about is customers. When Women's Best launches a new product, creates content or chooses celebrities to front an advertising campaign, the main goal is to meet women's needs and desires. If a company is looking for long-term success rather than making quick money, this is the right way to go.

As you review reports, try not to get lost in the numbers or let the numbers fool you. Conversations with clients and feedback on social networks can give you much more.

Speak the users' language

Instagram has long had its own culture, and brands don’t always fit into it. Poor quality photos, inappropriate captions and spam will only harm you, and clients may not give you a second chance. Be careful when communicating with users from different countries and cultures: many PR failures have been due to a failure to adapt.

Let clients talk

Women's Best strives to create viral content. Comments on posts often start discussions and simple conversations: this helps make the page a place of attraction for customers. Monitoring user comments helps you better understand your audience and find an approach to them.

Don't neglect social media tools

Marketers have long had a wealth of tools to help them create and publish content. A business that ignores them loses. Find out the best times to post to get feedback and optimize your employees' performance. Pay attention to the algorithms that the social network implements and learn to work with them.

Log out of your account

Women's Best actively collaborates with other companies and celebrities, and also sponsors events. According to Kurtzmann, after each “publication” the number of subscribers and their engagement increases sharply.

December 25th is the birthday of Conrad Hilton, the man who built a hotel business empire and took the hospitality industry to a new level. Hilton Corporation and 9 other legendary companies of our time - in a special ELLE review.

Microsoft

Microsoft founder Bill Gates demonstrated his talent as a programmer while still in school, developing a lesson schedule that allowed him to be in a class with as many girls as possible every time. Who would have thought then that the savvy teenager had ahead of him - the creation of a transnational corporation that would develop the world's most popular operating system, Windows. Gates decided to start his own business in 1975, and in less than forty years his brainchild went from three employees and 16 thousand dollars in the bank to the status of a business giant (almost 90 thousand people on staff) and the largest manufacturer of software, mobile phones and computers. technology. By the way, if you decide to try your luck and become part of the Microsoft team, keep in mind that the company takes great pleasure in recruiting women and even hosts summer camps for high school girls to spark their interest in the industry. But despite this, be prepared for an extraordinary selection procedure (for example, during testing, candidates have to answer questions like “why are sewer manholes round”), as well as for fierce competition - for one vacancy in the company there is an average of 1 million 300 thousand resumes.

McDonald's

Brothers Mac and Dick McDonald became fast food pioneers when they opened the first self-service restaurant in December 1948. It is likely that their business would have remained a project on the scale of the state of California if it had not been for a nimble supplier of cocktail mixers named Ray Kroc, who, by the way, was on the verge of bankruptcy at the time of his acquaintance with McDonald's. It was he who believed in the future of the company and launched the sale of franchises, and in 1961 bought the business from his brothers for $2.7 million. The company was created by him in 1955, and already in 1965 it managed more than 700 restaurants in the United States. The first foreign McDonald's opened in Canada in 1967, after which the hamburger corporation began its victorious march across the planet. In Russia, the opening of the first McDonald's took place on January 31, 1990 and caused an incredible stir: as many as 30 thousand people lined up for overseas cheeseburgers, despite the frost. By the way, respecting the local traditions of different countries, the company adapts the menu and presentation of dishes: for example, there is no Big Mac on the menu of Indian restaurants, but there is Maharaja Mac, made from lamb meat. In total, McDonald's has more than 35 thousand restaurants in the world, and, despite scandals and lawsuits (it is worth recalling the story of the acclaimed documentary film "Double Help", as well as the recent court case won by Jamie Oliver), the company maintains its incredible popularity : more than 70 million people become its clients every day.

Dell

Michael Dell did not shine with his abilities at school, but already at the age of 12 he demonstrated his extraordinary talent as an entrepreneur, earning $2,000 by distributing a magazine subscription. The simple craft opened up the technique of direct sales for the young businessman: Dell found out the names of newlyweds by sending them greeting cards offering them a two-week free subscription. Amazingly, it was this direct sales technology that later became the signature know-how of the Dell business empire - a developer, manufacturer and seller of computers, servers and software. The company (which Dell founded at the age of 19, with $1,000 in his pocket) was the first in its industry to refuse to work with intermediaries and exclude warehouses from the business chain: computers here are assembled only upon order from a client and delivered directly to the buyer, offering them as bonus: constant service support, minimum prices and numerous bonus gifts. It was Dell that, for the first time in its industry, decided to sell computers via the Internet. With such bold innovation and exceptional customer focus, it's no surprise that the corporation topped Fortune magazine's list of "Admired Companies" in 2005.

Inditex

If the name of the Spanish company Inditex doesn't mean much to you, believe me, you are very familiar with its brands: Zara, Oysho, Massimo Dutti, Bershka, Pull and Bear, Stradivarius - and this is not the whole list. The history of the corporation began in the 70s, when Spanish entrepreneur Amancio Ortega decided to open an inexpensive but fashionable clothing store and called it Zara. The business turned out to be successful, Ortega continued to open more and more stores, which in 1985 formed the Inditex holding. Further - more: new brands were born within the corporation, each with its own style and target audience, then textile, accessories, and shoe stores appeared. Thanks to the diversity of brands and the ability to instantly respond to demand dynamics, Inditex has turned into a real business empire, demonstrating fantastic growth rates. Today the company owns more than 5 thousand retail outlets on all 5 continents and does not plan to stop there.

Disney

The most popular family entertainment empire, the Disney Corporation has gone from a tiny studio in a garage to one of the world's most powerful giants over nine decades. Animation was Disney's clear vocation: he began drawing comics at the age of seven, took a course in caricature and studied at the Academy of Fine Arts. Having started in 1923 with cartoons about Alice in Wonderland, five years later he introduced Mickey Mouse to the public (whom, by the way, he himself voiced), and seven years later he received an Oscar - the first of a record 29! In 1937, Disney gave the world Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the highest-grossing film of all time (surpassed only by Gone with the Wind), which ushered in an entire era of feature-length cartoons. This was followed by the classics “Bambi”, “Dumbo”, “Beauty and the Beast”, the company gained a whole army of fans. After numerous letters from viewers asking to visit his studio, Disney decided to open a new business - an amusement park, which ultimately became the key to the company's financial stability and made Walt's heirs billionaires: by 1960, income from Disneyland exceeded income from the film studio. Today, the Walt Disney Productions company, which is the second (after Time Warner) media holding, owns several film and recording studios, 535 branded stores, several newspapers and magazines, its own TV network, hockey and baseball teams, parks in different countries of the world, and an annual turnover is 21 billion dollars. I wonder what baggage the Disney empire will bring to its centenary?

LVMH

Guerlain, Givenchy, Hennesy, Bulgari, Marc Jacobs, Benefit, Don Peregnon and many, many other names of iconic luxury brands are all LVMH. The French concern, owned by Bernard Arnault's family and today the world's largest manufacturer of luxury goods, appeared in 1987 thanks to the merger of two key market players - Louis Vuitton and Moët Hennessy. This deal marked the beginning of numerous acquisitions and mergers, the largest of which would have been the failed acquisition of Gucci in 1999. The luxury empire, with a turnover of more than 20 billion euros a year, includes companies producing clothing, watches, wine and spirits, leather goods, perfumes and cosmetics. LMHV also includes an auction firm, financial publications, an art magazine, hotels and a radio station. Declaring luxury as its passion, the company strives for perfectionism in everything and is actively working to find and develop talent. In addition to direct business development, LVHM pays attention to charity and responsible business conduct: the company supports a number of social projects and medical institutions, sponsors events in the arts, and is also involved in the preservation and restoration of cultural monuments.

Apple

It's even a little ridiculous to define Apple as a "personal computer manufacturer." I want to talk about this business empire, which has created a real cult out of its products, only in superlatives: created by the legendary Steve Jobs on April 1 (that's a joke) 1976, Apple today is the most valuable company in the world. She earns $300,000 every minute, the amount in her company bank account sometimes exceeds the amounts held in the US Treasury account, and in the first quarter of 2014 alone, Yabloko earned more than Google, Facebook and Amazon combined. Setting record after record, in March 2014 the company sold its 500 millionth iPhone, and apparently, it is not going to stop there - founder Jobs’s pledge to “stay insatiable” seems to have become the unspoken motto of the corporation.

L'Oreal

Hilton

Giving up on his unfulfilled dream of becoming a banker, 31-year-old Conrad Hilton, who came from a family of grocers, decided to try his luck in the hotel business. With his first hotel, the Dallas Hilton, opened in 1925, he set out to make it the best hotel in Texas—and ended up creating a hotel empire. Even the Great Depression, which hit America powerfully in the 20s, did not stop Hilton: forced to cede his company to creditors, he bought it back five years later and resumed active work, and in 1954 he stunned all of America by making a major deal and buying his main competitor - Statler Hotels - for $111 million. By the end of the 60s, Hilton owned more than 40 hotels in the United States, plus the same number abroad. The success of Hilton's business empire consisted of numerous innovations that are now considered an integral part of the hotel business. Thus, it was Hilton who came up with the “star” (by analogy with cognac) hotel rating system. He also proposed integrating hotels and casinos (which instantly increased the number of customers), opening hotels at the airport and putting quality of service at the forefront. In addition, Hilton liked to visit competitors' hotels, observing the atmosphere and behavior of clients. It was at the Hilton Corporation that a system of rewarding regular customers was introduced, an information and reference system for booking rooms together with air and train tickets, and even the Pina Colada cocktail was created at the Hilton Hotel. Today the corporation has 3,800 hotels of various levels in 88 countries. It is noteworthy, by the way, that after the death of Conrad Hilton, the empire he built became, in accordance with his will, the property of the Hilton Foundation. However, one of the businessman’s sons managed to challenge his father’s dying will in court, and a few years later the business empire returned to the Hilton “family.”

Virgin Group

In 1967, the principal of the school where Richard Branson graduated said goodbye to his (far from the best) student with these words: “Congratulations, Richard! You'll either go to jail or become a millionaire." The prediction came true: Branson became one of the most famous - and most outrageous - rich people of our time, and his company became the greatest conglomerate of various business areas. It all started with an idea that was as bold as it was absurd: Branson, who suffered from dyslexia and, accordingly, had not read a single book, decided... to publish a magazine! From a magazine he moved to a music store, from stores to a record label, and away we go: hot air balloon operator, publishing house, international air travel, bridal clothing, jewelry and cosmetics online, vodka production, comic book production, condoms... It's hard to say What is more striking in this endless list is the scale or the spread. Even Branson himself is rumored to be unsure of exactly how many companies belong to his fantastic multi-brand, which now has combined revenues of $24 billion. It is obvious that the secret of the success of the Virgin corporation is courage, bordering on madness: it is not for nothing that Branson chose the name Virgin for his business as a designation of a “virgin pure” approach to business and the absence of any experience among any of the employees. A non-standard approach is manifested in Branson’s company at all levels: there is absolutely no subordination here, informality and creativity are encouraged, and employees calmly drink beer during the working day. And Branson himself, who is currently preoccupied with the development of space tourism, no more or less, still loves adventure, shocking antics and his immortal sweater, which he does not refuse even at meetings with royalty.

Every minute another Vitale Joe customer is born

How to create your own empire

How to create your own empire

The story of General Tom Thumb's meeting with Lincoln is taken from the book The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb; all other episodes and facts are from Saxon’s biography, Kundardt’s book “F.T. Barnum - America's Greatest Showman" and the autobiography of F.T. Barnum, published by George Bryan. Biographies of Barnum written by Root and Wallace also served as supporting materials.