Al Gosling and Extreme: Close-up
Al Gosling is a spontaneous entrepreneur. When I first speak to him on the phone he cuts me short, “actually, could I call you back in five minutes?” he asks. Five minutes later my phone rings again, “sorry about that, I really needed a cup of tea”.
By Dan Matthews
I wonder for a moment if he makes his business decisions in the same ‘response to stimulus’ kind of way. But instead of “I need a cup of tea”, it’s “I need to launch a new clothing range”.
Looking at the pattern of businesses that have sprung up under his Extreme banner in the last fifteen years, you’d be
tempted to answer that question with a big fat ‘yes’. And even Gosling himself admits it all started rather haphazardly.
“The first thing I ever did was sell board shorts out of the back of my Renault 5 when I was 17,” he laughs. “I worked in the City and the music business and travelled around the Bahamas, working on boats and as a pilot.
“But I have a passion for extreme sports, and I thought to myself if could create a business around my hobbies, I’d be a very happy man. That’s when, at 24, I came up with the idea for the TV distribution business.”
Moving back to the UK, Gosling teamed up with fellow adrenalin junkie Tom Hussen. The pair borrowed £20,000 from friends and family. They got a phone, a PC, and found premises in a barn next to Gosling’s parents’ house in Essex.
The idea was simple: approach production companies specialising in extreme sports flicks and offer to distribute their material to TV stations. With no cash in the bank the pair got sign-off (and money) for programmes from the channels first, before lodging enquiries with production houses that fitted their brief.
Between 1995 – when Extreme Group founded – and 1998, Gosling concentrated on building his core business. But soon the wanderlust that today symbolises the company began to take hold of its founder.
Cue a string of business launches and licensing deals that, over the next 10 years, grew into an empire encompassing hotels, paintball, fashion accessories, art, insurance and nearly everything in-between; a grand total of around 30 businesses.
So why isn’t Extreme a household name like Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin? There are two reasons according to Gosling. Firstly he admits Extreme is still basically a collection of smallish concerns, unlike Virgin’s numerous super-brands. Secondly (and unusually for a British entrepreneur) a large slice of Extreme’s customer base is outside the UK.
Take Gosling’s second endeavour, a sports channel for TV paid for by $22m funding from a joint venture with cable company UPC, set up in 1998. It launched in 18 countries before it came to the UK and today it’s aired in a dozen languages and 75 countries worldwide.
Few of Extreme Group’s businesses that launched between then and now have targeted Brit-based customers exclusively. Most of its licensing deals, for example, are done on a geographic basis. Each licensee has an international ‘territory’ in which to ply their wares under the Extreme banner.
“Once the TV channel was flying we took the logo into different areas like retail and drinks, then we drove those brands forward in different countries. In 2005 we really started to motor, it’s motoring harder and faster now than ever.
“We got critical mass, a little piece clicked in, and this incredible whirlwind started. But I’ve spent 14 years building this business, and it’s not a dotcom that explodes in your face, we ground bloody hard work to make it happen over the years.”
I’m tempted to draw a comparison between Gosling – a blond-haired, thrill-seeking go-getting entrepreneur with a penchant for starting businesses – with Sir Richard Branson. A recent press release from Extreme Group calls on fans the brand to come up with “some mad, bizarre, bonkers and truly scary dares” for the chief exec – need I say more?
I venture the question, and Gosling is unimpressed. “I am compared to Branson daily, twice yesterday. He and Stelios [another common comparison] have both had huge successes with airlines; I’ve never had one massive success, more like lots of little ones, but it’s still a challenge I relish.”
Gosling is a thrill seeker because it’s what he enjoys, and his business – as the name suggests – is all about adrenaline. He wouldn’t throw himself out of an aeroplane to get on TV, but he would if he thought it would be a laugh.
Like Branson, however, he’s partial to a good business start-up. His two newest ventures are in retail and leisure sectors and are probably his most ambitious since Extreme’s inception.
One is a major new chain of sports clothing outlets. The flagship, located in Guilford and launching in September, is vast and will occupy two stories: the ground floor housing sporting apparel and equipment, the first a big café-cum-restaurant.
The other is a hotel chain start-up which Gosling plans to roll out from early 2009. Starting in London and pushing across the virgin lands of the Middle East in the years that follow, he plans to shake up the leisure industry in the region – no less.
“We have plans to develop 18 hotels across the Middle East, but these little puppies take between three and five years to get off the ground,” he explains. “The concept of our hotels will be about the experience, currently the market is dominated by big property companies, so there’s not much innovation.”
Grand designs indeed, but Gosling thinks he has the right people in place to get both his retail and hotel pushes up, running and making money. His recruiting of managing directors is now an exact science; you need to trust your senior staff when you’re heading up an empire of 30 businesses.
Gosling knows this only too well. He had his fingers burnt in 2004 when he bought the struggling skate shop chain Legends, and employed the wrong man to turn it around. “My biggest fuck-ups have been to do with recruiting managers,” he admits.
“Basically we bought 22 shops out of administration for a small amount of money, funded the turnaround, and he screwed it. It’s our fault ultimately; he was totally the guy to do the job.”
Now Gosling is a lot more careful when he hires: “I do five interviews, including team interviews, I take them out for lunch and dinner, and once I’ve made the decision I watch them like a hawk for the first three months.”
Therein lies the key to Extreme’s growth: spot an opportunity, get the wheels turning, then install an expert manager to see the project through. “I like working quickly, so I need the right people to help make each job a success,” he beams. “I think we’re just about there, now.”
