John Quelch Quotes

All of this talk of recession offends me. I am delighted that bankers have less money.

I'm terrified of being poor, I always have been. It's growing up as a Methodist. I'll spend that bit of extra money to get a better seat on a train sometimes, because it's quieter and calmer, but I refuse to spend money on clothes.

In troubled times the last thing you want to do is to stick your money into a film. It's such a gamble.

Even without an economic downturn, women sometimes want to keep their shopping habits to themselves.

Uncertainty is killing this economy.

I never really had an itch for gambling. I work hard for my money, so I don't like going out and giving it away like that.

Anyone who lives within his means suffers from a lack of imagination.

Frugality is for the vulgar.

Every time I am tempted to buy some dopey thing, I hear my late father's voice: 'Do you really need that?' He was big on saving money and buying as much security as possible. He also encouraged charitable giving. So, I am responsible with currency.

I'm not really a betting person. I work too hard for my money to give it away.

Markets don't like instability, investors shy away from uncertainty, and consumer confidence goes down in difficult times.

I have a habit of collecting all my old stuff. I still have all my old clothes and old cars, but my wife spends all my money.

I'm very frugal, so I don't like to shop because I'm afraid everything is going away.

I've been really frugal with money since way back, so I can't buy something if it's too expensive. I'm not that brave.

Sometimes I feel like I could have been a Depression-era person, just because of my need to make sure that I'm conservative in how I think about money.

Sleeping in my office isn't very comfortable, but it's my choice to save for my daughter's college instead of spending money on a D.C. apartment.

I am not the sort of person who will wake up and go and buy myself a Ferrari.

...that in spite of living in a mansion an American is not above wearing a pair of secondhand pants, bought for fifty cents.

Consumer spending is now plunging at serious-recession rate ... even if the rescue now in train succeeds in unfreezing credit markets, the real economy has immense downward momentum. In addition to financial rescues, we need major stimulus programs.

Department store Santas are apparently being trained to lower children's expectations about toys because of the recession. Yeah, it's weird when you ask Santa for a train set and he's like, 'Yeah, how 'bout a bus token?

Consumption is the death of capital, and the only valid arguments in favor of consumption are arguments in favor of death itself.

I'm not stingy. I'm just afraid of being an easy mark. People wouldn't have money long if they didn't ask how much things cost.

Who would you trust right now? Which bank would you trust? Which investment would you trust? Do you really want to put your money; do you want to suffer more of these losses that we just had? You know, these volatility that we see is just unexplainable by any rational standards. Nobody has any clue about how to explain this, and nobody wants to experience that. So, we hold more money back, we don't necessarily want to invest in the market and by default, people are saving more.

In an economic recession, naturally, when you ask people to list their priorities, they're going to place a higher priority on the immediate economic situation.

It's the deleveraging that's going on right now that has caused the credit crisis.