Seán Quinn was among friends when he spoke yesterday morning at a business conference in his own hotel, the Slieve Russell in Co Cavan. Ten years since he last spoke at a public meeting, the tycoon drew a crowd of more than 400 to hear his reflections on life, business and innovation.
To an attendance larger than that at the annual meetings of certain quoted companies, he spoke unscripted for 45 minutes about the creation of an empire that stretches from the Border plains of Cavan and Fermanagh to east Europe, Russia and India.
Notoriously media-shy, Quinn opened by saying he failed to sit his 11-Plus exam when he was a schoolboy many decades ago. This displeased his mother but his father was not at all disturbed. "He'll be fine. He'll help me with the farm. He'll be all right."
Suffice to say that Mrs Quinn need not have worried. If her son is not now the richest man in Ireland, he certainly ranks among the wealthiest entrepreneurs. But forget farming. Addicted to diversification and the relentless drive for expansion, Seán Quinn's interests now straddle insurance, cement, hospitality, radiators, glass, plastics, property, energy, stockbroking and banking.
"We came from a very simple background and we try to make business always simple. We don't believe in too much fuss. We have never had a feasibility study done in our lives," he said.
"I don't use a mobile phone. I play cards in a house at night where you have to go out to the front street to go out to the toilet. I enjoy that. I live a very simple life. That's the way I want to continue living that life. . . It gives my brain, in my view, much more time to do what it's best at doing."
This from a man whose core company made profits last year of €432 million and whose separately managed private family interests took in profits of €200 million. In the billionaire league, steady growth in a single sector or market simply doesn't wash.
A double-digit man to the marrow, Quinn said he avoids investments with modest rates of return. "We always follow the bigger return. Some people go for safe returns. We don't like 3, 4 or 5 per cent returns."
His folksy story-telling may be akin to that of Warren Buffett, the US tycoon behind the hugely successful Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate. But while legions of faithful shareholders follow the sage of Omaha with ritualistic fervour, the Ballyconnell maestro has no one to answer to but himself.
Still, he feels like spreading the wealth around. "We were too greedy for too long," he said. In future, Quinn Group will "leverage a lot of the profits towards management and staff". He did not elaborate, but such remarks will be read with interest by workers in the organisation.
Quinn's management style is designed to help people realise their own potential. "If we haven't got people to do it, we acquire them. If someone wants out, we never ask them to stay."
He has concerns about the competitiveness of the Irish economy and sees enormous opportunities in places such as India, a relatively new area of interest for him.
He thinks Irish businesspeople are world class and expresses admiration for organisations such as AIB and CRH, his biggest competitor in the cement sector. He has praise, too, for Michael O'Leary at Ryanair. Faced with such a rival in a new sector, "we would try to avoid it".
Quinn said he isn't "overly shy" but prefers to do things his own way. Of public speaking, he is circumspect. "It's been 10 years since I last did it so it'll definitely be 10 years before I do it again."
