FTSE

I did promise to continue my non-Brentford travelogue, but in fact, it will turn into another endeavour. A year or so ago, I had the idea of following (via a very scenic route) my friend Tom Levitt's lead in his book The Business of History, published last year. This was a kind of update of another book, written in 1925 by one William Beable called The Romance of Great Businesses. Beable selected 32 businesses on slightly eccentric criteria, and only 4 of them survived intact

I found Allied Breweries rather fun, but I find Associated Dairies, aka ASDA crashingly dull, probably because their history is much shorter and carried out mainly in the days of corporate finance and private equity deals. All a bit dispiriting to an old socialistic business person like me! I have a healthy respect for those who make widgets and sell them to people who want widgets. I have little respect for financiers, though of course they are the ones who make money (and r

Preface This is the first of maybe 1 or maybe eventually 100 blogs about the fate of the 100 companies which comprised the first iteration of the FTSE in 1970. Not many are left, and the geek in me wants to look at what happened to them. I have recently read my friend Tom Levitt's scholarly book The Business of History which updates an analysis made of 32 prominent businesses made by one Henry Beable in 1925. This was published (obviously!) last year to mark the centenary. Th