The media-shy Anne and David Norman don’t like to talk too much publicly about their retail group despite building it into the biggest in the country.
They confirmed staff numbers in New Zealand and Australia have hit 11,000 at 700 stores though turnover remains private within the family-owned James Pascoe Group. They don’t release financials for the group but it has been speculated at well over the $2 billion mark.
The group’s retail interests include iconic Kiwi brands – department store Farmers, bookstore Whitcoulls and homeware store Stevens while their jewellery brands in New Zealand and Australia are Pascoes, Stewart Dawsons, Goldmark, Angus & Coote and Prouds the Jewellers.
The Normans have continued to invest in listed retailer The Warehouse to increase their stake to 19.7%, buying 265,539 shares for $540,707 in May, even though the share price continues to fall.
The couple first bought into the company in mid-2014 and have steadily increased their shareholding since then, following a 50% drop in the share price since they first bought in.
Analysts said it didn’t signal a takeover attempt given The Warehouse founder Stephen Tindall and his foundation still own a combined controlling stake in the company although, if he joined forces with the Normans, they could have a good chance of taking the struggling retail giant private again.
First Retail Group managing director Chris Wilkinson says the Normans are well-known as clever retail managers “quiet achievers – they’re very strategic in the way they do business.”
“Yes, we think there’s some real opportunity for the Normans’ recipe to turn things around [at the Warehouse],” he said.
The Normans hold a passive 18.6% stake in The Warehouse they built up gradually although are out of the money given the retail group’s share price slump in the past couple of years.
What isn’t so widely known is the other family members working in the group. The Normans’ son, Myles Norman, leads Prouds the Jewellers in Australia while their daughter Victoria Nicholls and son Greg Norman are buyers for the group. The Normans’ son-in-law, Brett Nicholls, oversees the group’s property department.
David remains managing director and he Anne are the only directors.
The origins
Pascoe was founded by James Pascoe in 1906 as a small jeweller, three years before hardware salesman Robert Laidlaw launched the mail order business that became Farmers. The Pascoe business has been under the direction of James Pascoe’s granddaughter, Anne, and her husband since the 1980s.
The “old school” couple have previously said they don’t take profits out of the group, preferring instead to reinvest back in the businesses and “just let them grow” without the burden of debt often associated with private equity investors. They have never sold a business.
They have gained a reputation for revitalising flagging businesses after successfully turning around Farmers out of a financial slump in 2003. One of the few times they have agreed to media interviews was in 2009 when they commissioned a centenary book to celebrate Farmers’ 100th birthday.
They also bought 57 Whitcoulls stores and five Borders stores in 2011 after the Australian owner went into voluntary administration.
They have been recognised for their business success – being inducted into the Business Hall of Fame in 2011 and were both made Companions of the Order for services to business in 2012. Anne was the only New Zealander named on a 2015 Forbes list of 50 of Asia’s power businesswomen.
Anne and David are said to live modestly in a $2.75 million Remuera house and co-own three other Remuera houses with each of their children. They also own three properties in Algies Bay, north of Auckland.
The couple are active philanthropists, with their primary charities being the Leukaemia and Blood Foundation and CanTeen – both Anne and David are said to have had siblings die of leukaemia-related diseases. In 2010 they founded the $25,000 annual Anne and David Norman Fellowship in Leukaemia and Lymphona Research at the University of Auckland’s Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences to support research into improving outcomes for patients with leukaemia and related cancers.
They also sponsor the Pascoe Cup business house tennis competition, which James Pascoe set up in 1924 and is the longest running corporate sponsorship in New Zealand.