An intimate interview between Paul Giannamore and Andy Ransom, CEO of Rentokil Initial, a FTSE 100 company and the world's largest pest control company. The conversation covers Ransom's upbringing in a small English village of about 500 people and marks his 10-year anniversary leading Rentokil, tracing the company's path to becoming a global powerhouse. Recorded informally over drinks at a pub. # Channel Presentation Observations ## Video Overview A long-form, on-location CEO interview (London pub setting) between the channel host ("Paul," a pest control industry advisor/broker) and Rentokil CEO Andy Ransom, framed around Ransom's 10th anniversary as a FTSE 100 CEO and the Terminix acquisition. ## Intended Audience - **Pest control industry professionals and M&A insiders.** The host references industry-specific shorthand without explanation: "PCT 100," "density plays," "bolt-ons," and notes "as a broker" when probing hygiene M&A. - **Viewers familiar with pest control deal-making.** The host opens with: *"when I started advising pest control companies back in 2003 Rentokil North America was a 20 million dollar business"* — assuming audience interest in industry consolidation history. - **Business/leadership-curious viewers.** Broad framing: *"The Making of a Global Powerhouse | An Intimate Chat with an FTSE 100 CEO."* ## Claimed / Demonstrated Scope - **Long-form executive interviews with major pest control and service-business leaders.** The entire video is a single ~unbroken sit-down conversation with a sitting FTSE 100 CEO. - **Industry M&A and investment perspective.** Substantial discussion of acquisitions, multiples, margins, and consolidation: *"executed the largest M&A transaction in the space"*; *"you're kind of running out of inventory... there's a scarcity of premium assets."* - **Conversational, personal tone.** Includes off-topic banter (a mugging anecdote, Taylor Swift fandom, Guy Ritchie films, ordering drinks), suggesting the channel blends business substance with casual personality. ## Observable Presentation Patterns - **Host positions himself as an insider with long-standing relationships:** *"I think back to the conversations that I've had with Andy over the years and they are by far the most interesting and entertaining."* - **Host discloses his advisory/broker role in the industry:** *"when I started advising pest control companies back in 2003"* and *"that's why after our coffee at the end of the day here I'm buying you the pint."* - **Direct audience address:** *"for my viewers... don't start cutting down to the muscle... you always invest in people"* (relaying Ransom's advice to viewers). - **Producer/behind-the-scenes moment:** closing line *"just do it again with the film in this time"* reveals a small production crew and reshoot practice. ## Explicit Self-Description Evidence - No formal channel tagline or self-description appears in the transcript itself; identity is conveyed through the title framing ("An Intimate Chat with an FTSE 100 CEO") and the host's demonstrated industry-advisor persona. ## Notes for Synthesis - Creator claims vs. demonstration: no direct channel self-claims are present; all identity evidence is **demonstrated** through format (elite CEO access), tone (pub setting, banter), and audience assumptions (unexplained industry jargon). # Delivery Observation Document ## Overview A conversational, long-form interview (facilitated by the host, Paul) with Rentokil CEO Andy Ransom, conducted in a casual London pub setting. The delivery is informal, anecdote-driven, and highly conversational, with the interviewee doing most of the extended talking. ## Tone - **Warm and self-deprecating**: Ransom frequently undercuts his own status: > "I'm a genuinely I'm a simple guy" and describes his own answer as > "a terribly lame answer lame but sort of true" - **Casual pub-chat register**: Frequent interjections, incomplete sentences, humor: > "we're certainly good at killing killing things but but not uh not that way" - **Direct and blunt on business points**: > "the answer to that question is carefully" (on harmonizing pay plans) ## Vocabulary & Signature Phrases - **"Keep it simple" framing**: Repeated explicitly: - > "a CEO who likes to keep it simple and execute" (host's framing) - > "I like to try and keep things simple because I'm a genuinely I'm a simple guy" - > "and keep it simple to start with" - **"Light bulb moment"** — used at least twice: - > "this was this was a a real light bulb moment for me" - > "that was a real light bulb moment" - **"Major on"** as a verb — recurring idiom: - > "I've always always majored on safety" - > "that's what I major on" - > "that's really what I've majored on" - **"Density" / "densification"** as core strategic vocabulary, repeated many times: > "once we really sat and modeled density and how do you create dense networks" ## Teaching / Communication Habits - **Binary framing to simplify decisions**: - Technology investment: > "we invest in technology for one of two things" - M&A categories: > "there's really two sorts of maybe three Acquisitions we look for" - **Anecdote-first structure**: Most points open with a story (Oklahoma City bombing lawsuit, German comedian, flea spectrum of light, Taylor Swift at Wembley) before extracting the business lesson. - **Explicit distillation of principles**: - > "a half decent plan that you execute The Living Daylights out of will always give you better results than the perfect plan" - > "Innovation is not a product and it's not a process it's a state of mind" - **Repetition for emphasis**: > "every single meeting in the company every single meeting in the company board meeting management meeting Branch meeting site meeting starts with safety every single one" - **Hedging and self-correction**: > "I came up with this thing I didn't come up with it" — he corrects himself mid-claim. - **Appeal to borrowed authority**: Quotes Jack Welch: > "surround yourself with people who are better than you and then get out of their way" ## Interviewer (Host) Patterns - **Teases transitions with humor**: > "we've talked about gun rights let's talk about the palestinian-israeli conflict" - **Sets up answers with pre-framing**, e.g., introducing the density topic, Terminix acquisition timing, and innovation strategy before asking. - **Personal asides** about being mugged, his letter to Alan Brown, and the Taylor Swift poem. ## Stable Patterns vs. Isolated Moments **Stable (repeated across the conversation):** - Simplification into twos and threes - Anecdote-then-principle structure - "People first" language: > "the whole model is about people it starts and finishes with people" - British colloquialisms ("boozer," "bloke," "pint," "mate") **Isolated (insufficient repetition):** - Self-described "deal junkie" identity — mentioned once directly - The "cities of the future" / 2050 framing — introduced once, though tied to the recurring density theme ## Uncertainty Notes - Transcript contains apparent transcription artifacts ("renukil," "rental," "rent a kill," "run a kill" for Rentokil; "shattered" likely for "chatted"); quoted examples above reflect the transcript as supplied. - Pauses, laughter, and non-verbal delivery cannot be assessed from text alone; tonal observations rest solely on word choice and phrasing. # Position Record: Andy Ransom Interview — "The Making of a Global Powerhouse" (Rentokil) ## Speakers - **Andy Ransom** — CEO, Rentokil (identified in transcript as CEO; ~10 years in role at time of recording, 2023) - **Paul** — interviewer, pest control industry advisor/broker since 2003 (self-identified context) - **Brett** — Terminix CEO, referenced, not speaking - **John Myers** — Rentokil North America lead, referenced, not speaking --- ## 1. Rentokil's Growth & Scale - **Paul:** Rentokil North America grew from ~$20M revenue (2003) to over $2B (2023), creating billions in shareholder value and executing the industry's largest M&A transaction (Terminix). Attributes this to Ransom's leadership. - **Ransom:** Declines to claim he envisioned the scale from the start: *"Did I actually sit there and envisage that that's what we'd go on to do? No. But would I have thought there's any reason we couldn't do it? No."* ## 2. Safety - **Ransom:** Safety obsession stems from an explosives-business fatality (~30 years ago at a prior chemical employer) where a father-son team suffered a fatal explosion after he promised "no incidents on my watch." Every company meeting — board to site level — **starts with safety**. - **Position:** *"Show me a company that takes safety seriously and has a great safety record, I'll show you a successful company."* Safety record is a **litmus test** and diligence tool in acquisitions. - On firearms for technicians (Paul's question): *"I don't think that's in the company policy... we're certainly good at killing things, but not that way."* ## 3. Career Path - **Ransom:** Village upbringing (father a postman, no family car/home); nearly left school at 16; stayed only because friends did; studied law; became M&A/litigation attorney at ICI. - **Oklahoma City bombing litigation:** Johnnie Cochran sued ICI (ammonium nitrate used in the bomb). Ransom volunteered to defend despite doubting his own fitness for it; spent five years in North America. - After ICI's takeover, joined Rentokil with two colleagues; got pest control to run a year in — a **"light bulb moment"**: a people business, not a product business. ## 4. Strategy & Execution - Portfolio reset using Bain's four-box grid: exit low-margin/low-growth (e.g., **City Link**, sold for £1 — *"we never got paid the pound"*); focus on pest and hygiene. - **Density as the core insight:** bolt-on M&A at city level to build dense routes enhances profitability. - **Execution over perfection:** *"A half decent plan that you execute the living daylights out of will always give you better results than the perfect plan."* Claims Rentokil beat its three-year rolling plans every year for a decade — offered as a point about execution, "not trying to sound conceited." ## 5. People & Culture - **Core philosophy:** the model "starts and finishes with people." His CEO job description: get 58,000 people out of bed, doing great, safe, unsupervised work happily — and back the next day. - Employer-of-choice program, promotion from within, heavy training investment, tracked KPIs (vacancies, time-to-fill per branch globally). - **Tension acknowledged:** longevity may sacrifice some fresh outside thinking and margin upside, but improves execution reliability. He admits sometimes it would be good if someone moved on. - Won UK best employer award; "Apple came second." ## 6. Terminix Acquisition - First looked at Terminix over a decade ago (under CDN/R ownership) — couldn't afford it. - **Trigger:** Brett's tenure — "a few months in" gave a green light due to perceived cultural alignment (servant leadership). His biggest worry: colleague retention and culture fit, since big mergers fail on **cultural misalignment or poor execution**. - Post-close: culture fit "astonishingly good"; frontline retention **up in both businesses**. An investor rumor of departures traced to ~six people. - Playbooks preserved: Terminix adopting Rentokil's commercial playbook; Rentokil deferring on termite/residential — playing to each other's strengths. - Integration deliberately paced at **36 months**, not 18–24 ("crashing it together" rejected). - Pay-plan harmonization: "carefully" — piloting before moving to a single plan; benefits harmonization already underway. ## 7. M&A Outlook - Will be **more selective in North America** during integration but will not miss "must-have" assets; will "incubate" such deals if integration capacity is full. - More activity expected outside North America and in hygiene/well-being; open in ~92 of 93 markets. ## 8. Disagreement: Asset Scarcity (preserved) - **Paul (challenge):** Rentokil is "running out of inventory" — scarcity of premium pest control assets, with financial sponsors active. - **Ransom (qualified pushback):** "Yes and no." Agrees at the top end of the PCT 100, but notes regeneration at the bottom, margin uplift potential for acquired ~10%-operating-margin businesses, and 18,000–20,000 remaining US pest companies. *"I think you're all right"* — partially conceding. ## 9. Technology vs. Innovation (explicitly separated) - **Technology:** invests only if it (a) lowers cost-to-serve or (b) gives customers a better/premium service. Example of discipline: rejected flea light-spectrum research because the market was too small. - **Innovation:** *"Innovation is not a product and it's not a process, it's a state of mind."* Failures should be shared to avoid duplication. Notes the Israel AI rodent-recognition acquisition generated outsized media attention (FT front page); monetization of rodent facial recognition is "another debate for another day." ## 10. Innovation Centers - UK center (largest insect collection in Europe, mosquito/fly rooms, competitor device testing) focused on commercial and rodents. - Newly announced (in this interview): **Dallas center for residential/termite**, with a Mobile, Alabama extension. - Ideation flows from frontline technicians (tracking gel origin story). ## 11. Global Expansion Philosophy - **City-based, not country-based** ("went into the top three cities" in Brazil). - **"Cities of the future"** thesis: identifying 2050 megacities; pest control grows faster than city GDP, which grows faster than national GDP. - Willing to enter volatile markets: Pakistan, Lebanon, Argentina — *"Pakistan is not for the faint-hearted."* Accepts failures: "you're never going to get it right all of the time"; majority wins dwarf the failures. - **Judgment deferred:** this strategy "can only be judged in about 10 or 20 years." ## 12. Hygiene - Ransom: hygiene growing as fast as pest, slightly higher margins, higher retention — "hygiene's the new pest." On a mission to convince markets to value it similarly. - **Constraint:** hygiene M&A is hard — fragmented, few medium-sized players; buildup must be city-by-city. ## 13. Economy - **Ransom:** doesn't expect a broad-based deep recession; UK is the toughest of his 93 markets but turning; Germany "wobbling"; pricing used to **recover input cost inflation only**, and will abate as costs abate. Bullish medium-term. - **Advice:** don't cut training or growth spend in downturns — Rentokil never did, including post-2008. ## 14. Lighter Positions - **Ransom on Taylor Swift:** genuine fan since her country era; top 0.25% of Spotify Swifties; attended Wembley with his daughter (noting he was the only man in the gents). His kids "think this is madness." - **Ransom on Guy Ritchie films:** favorite is *Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels*; loves *The Gentlemen* (with a language "health warning"); jokes he can't understand them — "then you've understood them." - Favorite Ritchie film exchange closes with both noting Ritchie's pub may bring a surprise guest; Ransom jokes they "might have a better chance to get Taylor Swift in here." --- ## Unresolved Tensions & Qualifications (summary) - Ransom simultaneously claims no grand original vision and near-total plan outperformance — held as stated, not reconciled. - Paul's asset-scarcity thesis vs. Ransom's partial concession. - Internal-promotion longevity vs. loss of outside thinking — acknowledged trade-off, not resolved. - Emerging-market bets explicitly framed as unjudgeable for 10–20 years. - Note: transcript is machine-generated; some names (e.g., "CD&R," "PCT," "Alan Brown," "Brett") appear in garbled forms and are recorded as contextually inferable from the conversation, not independently verified. # Speaker Attribution & Provenance Record **Video:** Andy Ransom: The Making of a Global Powerhouse | An Intimate Chat with an FTSE 100 CEO (Rentokil) **Video ID:** `01a168c8-bb38-7eef-a546-e4bfc3b14a60` ## Speakers & Roles ### Primary Identified Speakers - **Andy Ransom** — **Guest / Interviewee**. CEO of Rentokil (FTSE 100), marking his 10th anniversary year as CEO (2023). Former M&A attorney and executive at ICI. - **Paul** — **Interviewer / Creator (implied host)**. Identified by name in transcript ("thank you for your interest... Dear Paul" anecdote; Andy addresses him as "Paul" several times). Background: began advising pest control companies in **2003**; describes himself as a broker/deal participant ("after our coffee... I'm buying you the pint... I'm just letting you know I like to test the waters"). He filmed the opening segment in **Puerto Rico** and traveled to London for the interview. ### Secondary / Background Speakers - **Café server** — Unidentified service staff delivering drinks ("gents, I've got your cappuccino"); no substantive role. ### Narration - Opening monologue delivered by the **creator/host (Paul)** — not a separate narrator. ## Persons Referenced (Not Speaking) - **Alan Brown** — Former Rentokil leader; described as "a bit more central command and control" (labeled "my predator Alan" per speaker context — appears to be "my predecessor"). - **Chris Hunt(s)** — Current Rentokil corp dev figure (comparable to Andy's old role). - **John Myers** — Hired by Andy; ~14.5 years leading Rentokil North America. - **Brett** — Terminix CEO whose tenure signaled cultural alignment for the acquisition; referenced as a possible "Swiftie." - **Nick** — Prior Terminix leader; Andy knew him over the years. - **Brett's/Chris's colleagues ("Alex", "Malcolm")** — mentioned in passing by the interviewer/Andy. - **Johnny Cochran** — Referenced re: litigation after O.J. Simpson case; sued Andy's former chemical company over the **Oklahoma City bombing**. - **McVeigh and Nichols** — Oklahoma City bombers, referenced factually. - **Jack Welch** — Cited by Andy quoting a management maxim. - **Taylor Swift**, **Guy Ritchie** — Cultural references; interview takes place at "Guy Richie's boozer" (pub). ## Provenance & Source Notes ### Companies & Deals Referenced - **Rentokil** — FTSE 100; ~58,000 employees; ~2,000 branches; operations in **93 countries** (92 during Terminix integration). - **Terminix acquisition** — described as the largest M&A transaction in the pest control space; originally owned by **CD&R**; 36-month integration timeline. - **ICI** — Andy's former chemical employer; sold City Link for £1 (unpaid). - **ICI subsidiaries / explosives incident** — fatal explosion ~30 years ago involving a father and son; foundational to Andy's safety focus. - **Vector deal (VDA)** — put Rentokil among largest vector disease control providers; John Myers reportedly initially opposed. - **Israel acquisition** — AI-enabled IPM business; rodent facial recognition; became an FT front-page story per Andy. - Market entries: **Pakistan, Lebanon, Argentina, Brazil** (top three cities). - **PCT 100** — cited as industry ranking source. ### Media / Third-Party Claims Cited - **Financial Times** — Andy's interview ~3 weeks prior; Israel AI-rat story ran front page. - **Sky TV, The Guardian** — follow-up coverage of the AI rodent story. - **Bain Consulting four-box grid** — strategy framework used at Rentokil. - **Spotify** — statistic that Andy was in top 0.5%, then 0.25% of Taylor Swift listeners. - Awards claim: Rentokil named **best employer in the UK, with Apple second** (Andy's account). - CEO tenure claim: FTSE 100 CEOs "last maybe five years" — **host's characterization**, unverified. ### Personal Anecdotes (First-Party Claims) - Host's phone theft in London — **£20,000 spent at Apple Store in 15 minutes**; Krispy Kreme Uber Eats order; Apple Store staff quote ("we see this a dozen times a day"). Host's own account. - Andy's childhood: village of ~500 people; father a village postman; left-for-sixth-form decision; law degree; London law firm. ## Promotional Segments - **None explicitly flagged in transcript or metadata.** No sponsor reads, product promotions, or calls-to-action detected. ## Availability & Uncertainty - **Curated metadata:** Not supplied — no comment availability, channel, or verified speaker identities beyond transcript-internal evidence. - **Speaker identity confidence:** "Paul" named in transcript; surname/affiliation **unconfirmed**. - **No timestamps** present in transcript; none invented. - Interview appears to be recorded in a **Guy Ritchie-owned pub in London**; a closing remark ("just do it again with the film in this time") suggests a re-record, with no further context. when I started advising pest control companies back in 2003 renukil North America was a 20 million dollar business fast forward to 2023 and the company is now eclipsed over 2 billion in Revenue in North American Pest Control alone in addition over the years rental kills created billions of dollars in shareholder value and most recently executed the largest m a transaction in the space this wasn't an accident though this was all executed under the leadership of Andy Ransom a CEO who likes to keep it simple and execute 2023 is a special year for Andy not only did he just complete the Terminix acquisition but this year will be his 10th anniversary as the CEO of a ftse 100 company now the ftse 100 is the top 100 publicly traded companies in the United Kingdom and most of those CEOs last maybe five years but this year Andy is making it to 10. as I stand here on the coast of Puerto Rico I think back to the conversations that I've had with Andy over the years and they are by far the most interesting and entertaining and I think about getting back you know what that's exactly what I'm going to do I'm going to London making time why do we have to carry it home thank you how was your journey when did you get in I got on on Friday and it's official now after I don't know a few dozen stops in London over the years I'm now a crime statistic I was mugged you were mugged yeah get away I came out of a Posh Restaurant picked up my phone as soon as I put it to my ear three punks came one of them grabbed it and ran it went through really it was just one it was already embellishing in this story I know you are now Nick my phone as it were and um it took me you know I was with a buddy as soon as the the phone disappeared you know it's a race to try to turn this thing off and the thieves weren't particularly sophisticated the first thing they did was order 24 pound order of Krispy Kreme on ubereats this is can't make this up they did spend 20 000 pounds within the first 15 minutes at the Apple Store wow before everything was shut off and you know I'm still dealing with the aftermath now but I went over to the Apple Store on Regent Street yeah got a new phone and the guy was just like listen you know it we see this a dozen times a day in front of this store and he said you know you know somebody steals from you can't do anything because you could become the assailant yeah well that is true yeah but honestly it's a safe City it never happens it's never happened to me no wow I'm sorry to hear that wow can I do anything to drink what we like I think it's been a long day I'm gonna start with a coffee yeah I got a cappuccino please cappuccino just black black coffee any sugars not for many things and some sparkling water if I get one too yeah please yeah magic be right yeah it's uh no I have no London's always been a safe City I've never had an issue a German friend of mine says don't wear a watch don't you know hide your money and he didn't warn me about the phone no no it's a safe City yeah you just got to unlock it I did get a monkey for sure which makes me think of you know you at renica you guys are always talking about safety right yeah after this happened I thought about in North America I can literally think of dozens of companies where the owners and technicians have Concealed Carry Permits to carry firearms I would imagine runical North America has a lot technicians to pack heat I don't think that's in the company policy but we're certainly good at killing killing things but but not uh not that way no so when you're talking about safety you're more concerned with falling off the roof or those sorts of things for me saying I'm passionate about safety and for a very very good reason so years years ago I I my company I work for a chemical company and the business that I ran was in explosives and explosives is a dangerous thing and and so when I took over the business I said right when safety is going to be the most important thing and we're going to have no incidents at all on my watch and we did we had an incident um a father and a son working side by side and there was an explosion and one of them died and that had an incredibly profound impact on me as a as a manager as a leader and you know it started with this you know no one's going to die on out on my watch this it just isn't going to happen we're going to have a perfect safety record and then this horrific incident so it really had a huge impact on me so whatever job I've been doing wherever I've been whatever business I've always always majored on safety and I'm proud to say at brentical we've got an incredibly good safety record but as they were saying one accident is still one too many so every single meeting in the company every single meeting in the company board meeting management meeting Branch meeting site meeting starts with safety every single one and and you know I'm incredibly passionate about it but because of that horrific incident about 30 years ago well you know from an acquisition style you guys are the only acquirer in the industry that every time we're doing a deal you send folks out to do safety audits you're looking at signage you're looking at the equipment they have you're looking at the shoes you guys come in you issue all the brand new company shoes to folks yeah well the reason for that is a long since held the view that if you show me a company that takes safety seriously and has got a great safety record I'll show you a successful company very rarely do I see you know companies that are great at safety and they're not very good at anything else but plenty of times I see companies that don't take safety seriously what else are you not taking seriously it's about the most important Cornerstone right yeah it absolutely is you know we want everyone to go home safe at the end of every day so it is it's one of those sort of little um litmus tests you know what is what's the safety standard is like so um and that's one of the great things about I'm sure we'll talk about Terminix in a bit but I I had wondered well I wonder what their safety records going to be like and we did a lot of due diligence and the great thing is their safety standards are right up there without so that that was a real reassuring moment for me when we when we got to that moment say wow they're as good as rent to kill and we take it so seriously so yeah no number one for me every time safety you know one of the things you and I have never really shattered about is back I want to say it was 2007 or so I was not even 30 yet I decided that I was going to try to raise some money you guys had bought early in North America and I saw Pest Control is an interesting business I'm a young kid I decide okay I'm gonna track down Alan Brown I'm going to send him a letter so I said hey dear Alan you know I'm the process trying to raise private Equity Funds that love to buy running kill North America dropped it in the post went over the UK I was in the us at the time and anyway gents I've got your cappuccino mate thank you very much my pleasure there's your Americano and there's sparkling water yep wonderful thank you thank you sir no words and what I imagine happened is Alan probably tracked you down and said hey we're starting to make noise and get noticed the uh American crackpots are writing us letters handed you my letter and you sent me a nice letter that says Dear Paul thank you for your interest cheers thank you we're going to kill North America is not for sale it's Corridor our business but hey by the way if you happen to find anything interesting for us we're happy to take a look at it and back in those days you were the Corp Dev guy yeah that's right so you were doing what I guess Chris Chris Hunt's doing today back back in those days probably uh are you I was going to resist the Temptations I was doing it but better no I was always doing it differently yeah and it's absolutely right um so take me back though I remember you were what was it icr is that the name ICI ICI yeah so what you got your start as an m a attorney well I suppose I'll go back if you want to go if you want to go back to the ancient history of you know my I'd like to go back to a five-year-old Andy Ransom so I'm grown anyways I'm not sure I can remember that I'll do my best yeah look I mean I I was brought up in a tiny little village but 500 people in the village um my dad was a village Postman my parents didn't own their own home didn't even own a car actually so I went to this tiny little village school then I went to secondary school which wasn't very good and then I moved to a different part of the UK where I went to another school which was even worse than the first one so I don't you know reasonably it was a lovely upbringing wonderful upbringing but but a pretty uh down to unremarkable unremarkable and then and schooling was was equally unremarkable you know I was going to leave school at 16. I hadn't done particularly well and I got a job and I was going to leave and then one day I discovered that all my friends were staying on um to to do the sixth form as we call it um and and I thought well I don't want to be left behind so I went back to school um finished up and I did really well and then I went to University studied law and I did well doing that and then I became a lawyer um started in London law firm and then I joined this big Chemical Company and one thing rolled um into it another and I suppose my time at ICI I mean I'm a deal guy I'm a m a transaction lawyer and I did that for years and years and years what I found though was that for me I was a decent lawyer but I was a great lawyer but I was good at the transaction side it loved I loved the negotiation I loved the deal you still do I still don't know I'm an absolute deal junkie and I I can't get enough of that and then on this one fateful occasion um I was walking down the office one afternoon and um I saw the fax machine going remember a fax machine facts was coming through and and I picked up the facts off of the fax machine and I read it and oh my god um we were being sued my company Chemical Company was being sued and Johnny Cochran who'd just won the O.J Simpson case was suing my company for billions what the hell what was this all about and it was all in relation to the Oklahoma City bombing 168 people were killed in that incident the biggest terrorist incident on U.S soil um at that time and McVeigh and Nichols if you remember they were the guys who planted the bottom and caused this explosion they'd used our chemicals they'd use their fertilizer chemical ammonium nitrogen ammonium nitrate to create the bomb and Johnny Cochrane brought this this multi-billion dollar lawsuit and even though it's good you know I was in a litigation lawyer I wasn't an American attorney I looked at that and I said you know I I just want to be I I want to defend this I want this is outrageous I want to do this he never thought and said stopped and said well maybe I'm not the right guy to do this based on my experience well yeah I'm sure I did I'm sure it did for you know many many occasions I probably thought I shouldn't be doing this but it was important to me and and it was yeah so I went to my boss and I said look I I want to defend this and he made all the arguments you know why it wasn't a good idea but I moved the family to Canada we lived in Canada for a few years moved to America and I spent five years defending the company against what was an outrageous lawsuit and so that sort of took me away from mainstream deal making it took me into a different world I ended up running um part of the business when I was in America came back um I became head of M A and then as these things happen you know after a wonderful 20-year history of doing all sorts of things in the company we were taken over yep and that was a sort of well okay what do I want to do do I want to be a deal guy don't want to be an attorney do you want to be commercial and there were five of us running ICI at the time and three of us um sort of got together and said well maybe we could continue working together as a team and one thing led to another in this rental thing more no idea what this is about this came along and three of us came into into the company so I guess I got lucky because when I came in to rent a kill um they gave me all the stuff that he knew I could do the deal stuff and the legal stuff and they started to give me they I and my colleague started to give me some other responsibilities and about a year in I got pest control as the business to run and instantly I knew what a special business what a special industry that was and so it sort of it's quite gradual my move from deal making and corporate development and legal and all of that history too I just landed in the right place and it was such a such a different business from what I'd been used to that was about coming up with product and selling great products this was all about people and that was that was the minute I knew wow that I found my natural home this was this was a a real light bulb moment for me a very different type of business well interlock renekill was a very different business then than it was today when you came on board I think that was around the time of the City Link troubles right yeah Bank it's usually good coffee um yeah that was the back end of the City Link uh parcel carrier yeah loss making business and losing 50 million pounds a year I think it was didn't you guys sell it for like one pound and the Assumption of debt or something like well we sold it for one pound and we never got paid the pound so um yeah I got a long memory you didn't hire debt collectors for that no no so when you see you came on kind of in the mid-2000s um I mean could you have imagined back then you know obviously Runner kills a very different business now but you know if you think about the Andy Ransom that was doing Corp Dev and a variety of other things versus where you are now at the helm of what's one of the largest service organizations on the planet really um I mean did you imagine that you and your team could potentially take rather kill the such scale I it's difficult one to answer because you know did I did I actually sit there and envisage that that's what we'd go on to do no but would I have thought there's any reason we couldn't do it no I didn't I you know what was really clear was that the pest industry is an incredible industry and rent to kill had a fabulous position within that and and it had pockets of Brilliance and then Pockets that hadn't really been looked at and nurtured for many years it hadn't really had the investment in technology it hadn't really had the investment in Innovation but at its core was this kernel of brilliant people passionate people that had been in the industry for years and and so there was definitely really good raw material to work with I think you know I I'm not saying we we invented density but once we really sat and modeled density and how do you create dense networks that was a real light bulb moment to say well okay that means we can do lots of incremental bolts on M A they don't have to be national International they don't have to be big if we're if it's a good quality business could that enhance the density in a town or in or a city and really add to the profitability and that was a real moment once you realize that and you had the basic raw materials of good people good position good brand and then you could make those investments in technology and and in Innovation well that became the reality that became you know what the plan was the the right way plan as we call it is that around the top I mean in Prior years obviously there was City Link there was these big hygiene businesses renikil was not a majority pest control company when you came on board did you guys look at the portfolio and say well wait a second pest control's highest margin high visibility on cash flow Capital light we need to focus on there thought through the density thing when was the active decision made to say you know what let's become a world-class Pest Control organization we did a little exercise and it was based on Bain consulting's um the four box grid I think they came up with it in the 1950s so this is not really you know Cash Cow no exactly all of that so I mean you know one of the first jobs I I was given was was to come up with a strategy for the for the company and I've not really done a lot of strategy work before but I thought well no well find Johnny Cochran and uh exactly I've been too busy doing other things but I took the the Bane four bucks grid exactly which sort of worked out well which of the businesses we shouldn't be in here at all which are the businesses that are low margin low growth and really haven't got any great potential and that was they're the ones we need to get out of which are the ones that actually have got all the right raw materials and and passed as you say you know good level of growth good margin the ability to roll up into something much much bigger the ability to make a step change in investment in technology and Innovation so that we put in the top in the top right um and then hygiene which which you know if we had more time we could we talk a lot about and I do honey Gene is actually as good as Pest Control I've heard you almost say hygiene's the new password we have said that because it it it's growing as quickly its margins are slightly higher um its customer retention rate is even higher so you've actually got the same it's again it's a density play so it was quite clear the businesses we should de-prioritize and then it's quite clear the ones we should now the question then I was I was like a ball for Britain on this subject it isn't about the strategy and it isn't about the plan it's about execution and anyone who's ever worked with me or you know hung around me long enough knows that that's what I major on a half decent plan that you execute The Living Daylights out of will always give you better results than the perfect plan so it really is about execution and making sure that you deliver on the commitments you've set out to deliver so I can go back and I look now for a decade of three-year plans where do we think we're going to be in the next three years and then Roll It Forward another year roll it for another year I think we've beaten the plan every year over that 10 years I was not trying to sound conceited it's trying to make the point that if you execute the plan good things happen but for me the whole you know the magic source and this is you know this is how I feel but I also know it's how the pest industry feels for me the whole model is about people it starts and finishes with people so the technology is good and the Brand's good and what you do on the web's good and Innovation and all of that somebody asked me I was on stage on one of our events and I was a comedian there and he was he was um trying to have a bit of fun with me which was which was fine it wasn't 330 Germans and a German stand-up comedian asking me questions and then translating the answers oh boy into German it was a half the audience were really enjoying it the other half were cringing like that and he said to me he says you're a CEO he said it's not even a job what do you even do you know what oh this is a bit awkward you know what do I do what is the job and I came up with this terribly lame answer lame but sort of true okay I said I tell you what my job is I gotta get 58 000 people out of bed every morning I gotta get them to work I've got to get him to do an amazing job for their customers I've got to get them to do it safely I got a supervision without supervision on their own I gotta get them to do it happily then I gotta get them home again in the hope that they come back to work the next day and it was a it was a really lame answer but in that little anecdote is the kernel of what I think the business is all about if you can find good people engage with them Inspire them get them give them good training encourage them to develop their careers with you stay with you longer good things happen and that's the that's the key to execution in the pest business in the root based business so that's really what I've majored on if anything else about the last 10 years you know what do I think I've done well or haven't done so well I would say working on culture working on people has been the most important thing that I think that we've done at rental and I'm very very proud of what we've achieved there we don't just talk the talk I mean you guys have won so many you know best workplaces Awards which is really quite surprising it's a pest control company like how can it be such a great place to work so what are some of the things that you you know what are some of the initiatives that you guys have done over the years to really make sure you're putting your colleagues first I came up with this thing I didn't come up with it I when I worked in America in my old company I had a project called employer of choice and I thought I quite like the sound of that before a choice so that means people want to come and work for us so we sat down and did a lot of work with our colleagues and say well why do people want to come and well why do they want to stay what is it about the job and what is about Pest Control what's about rent kill that cause people to want to stay so we put a whole program it's less about initiatives and it's it's about creating this this culture and this this nice place to work and people say to me what's it like at rentco and I always say the same thing you know it's a really nice company it's nice people nice is very much underrated so we're trying to create this warm um Collegiate environment supportive environment that we help each other and that goes an awful long way but there's a very hard Edge side to it as well we measure a lot of things we I can tell you we got 2 000 branches around the world I can tell you well don't ask me but so you'll test me out but every single Branch around the world how many vacancies we've got in each branch in each row how many people have applied for for that job how many days has it taken to fill that and we track that we've been tracking that for years so you can see Trends in any city in the world so you can actually see is there a problem in the Shanghai Branch or is or is no it's always been challenging it's the same in the Bay Area of San Fran so the combination of of a supportive culture where we we spend a lot of time effort money on training we promote from within we really try not to hire from the street we promote every time there's a vacancy promote from within but also we track and we Trace you know kpis over a long period of time so we can see are we improving we've invested a huge amount in training Frontline Training management training and that's really really so we're investing in people and is those are the things that we've done I mean you've said quite rightly we've won awards we won indeed we you won the award for the best employer in the United Kingdom and apple came second you were in the Apple Store yeah so how does Pest Control it's really by working on that on that culture we're trying to be a good supportive nice place to work I hear it a lot I mean last time I a couple months ago I was having a a beer with Chris and I said why don't you leave you know the UK is cold it's dreary taxes why don't you leave that place go to the call pay no taxes make more money you got another run on you and he said you know running kills really a lovely place to work I just couldn't see myself anywhere so I'm going to tap up my pages because you know I'm just letting you know I like to touch the waters just to see what's going on um but yeah and one of the nice things you know and I came is back to execution if I look at my team the global team around me there's an awful lot of longevity there's a people have tended to build their careers here and they've tended not to move on now you can argue that you know sometimes they should leave one or two times you'd say it would be good if somebody moved because then it allows someone else to come through but if you've got a business and you're trying to do as we are a consistent execution model having people that have been doing it for a number of years and you'd see this typically in the industry people who stay in the industry is really really helpful for that execution so having people that have been with us 10 years and know what they're doing they don't need to be they don't need a lot of interventions yeah makes certainly makes my job an awful lot easier but it also means that the reliability of that execution is so much higher maybe you lose a bit the margins because you've not got the latest thinking from you know somebody joining from outside the industry but I I do think that counts for a lot well I think that's a great case study in juxtaposing run a killer Terminix right there was a lot of new people all the time from outside the industry with a bunch of brilliant ideas every 18 months when I think about rental North America you know you hire John Myers he's he's been at the switch now for how many years in fact 14 okay 14 15 14 and a half came out did you hire John yeah yeah okay yeah yeah you came on a year before he did that's right so you hired John you know when I look at what Runner kill has done um versus like an anti-c mix anti-semics I think um made an error and this is my opinion in the North American Market by putting a suite sending a suite over a brilliant guy but very culturally different um and I think a lot of foreign companies you know a lot of American companies make that mistake sending Americans over and vice versa but was that a specific decision to hire an American to run an American business or did it just work out that way because I just worked out that way I mean it John John was the right person at the right time but it was interesting when 14 years ago our Revenue North America would have been a couple hundred million 200 something like that 250 Maybe and I think you know we've grown John's grown the business has grown and but the management team has has grown tremendously as well and I I'm not a big student of business I don't read a lot of business school stuff but but I do remember reading years and years ago Jack Welsh in GE and he said the the key to being a successful leader is surround yourself with people who are better than you and then get out of their way and let them get on with that and that's more or less what he said and that's really my management philosophy so Michael you mentioned Alan my Predator Alan was a bit more Central Command and control I'm a little bit more well let's say fair I don't think people would recognize that description of me but I don't try and do John's job for him um I hold John to account and then John's John surrounds himself with you know a great team and that team has evolved over the years as well as the business has got bigger and then you know with the wonderful merger with Terminix we've now got an even bigger more impressive North America team so no we didn't we didn't set out and say right you know we need an American because it's America but I I think he's the right person and has done a super job over the last 14 years and I'd worked in in Canada and you know and America and they got used to the accent they figured it out eventually so yeah speaking of the Terminix acquisition at what point in time did you make the decision in your mind I'm doing this I first looked at um Terminix over a decade ago when they're owned by cdnr I went to New York um I can't remember the year exactly but I went to see dinner um and I took a look at it we couldn't afford it and CD and I wanted to do the float in any event but it was the first time I looked at it um I I see it as part of my job to know what the competition is doing so it wasn't just Terminix we were looking at but we I looked at Terminix many times over the last 10 years and track them very carefully known most of the Senior Management over there from one time or another few months into Brett's tenure that really was quite a a green light for me because my biggest worry when you put two big big businesses together there's two reasons why big mergers go wrong one is cultural misalignment and the other is poor execution so I didn't know Terminix well enough to know whether the cultural alignment would be as it needed to be and I knew Nick and I like Nick and I I knew him over the years but I wasn't sure what the culture under Nick was um but I started picking up Intel rumors whatever that under Brett it sounded like we were you know we were drinking from the same you know fountain or whatever he uses different terminology to me he talks about servant leadership without knowing it that's always been my model as well so I started to hear things in one sense good things about Terminix another sense worrying things because I kept thinking well if if they execute are they are they finally waking up then they're gonna they'll get away from us um and so I really liked what I heard about Brett and the team that he'd put together um so I suppose yeah it was it was you know a few months into Brett's um tenure that I started to saying okay you know we've been discussions in the past so I I knew a lot about the company but the bit I didn't know was how that culture um fit would go and that's been fantastic so so that was for me was the bigger thing I needed to understand were were we um you know coming from the same we've both been around 97 98 years the companies have got very similar history but was there a was there a danger of a big misalignment once I got comfortable no actually quite the opposite quite the opposite the culture fit has been astonishingly good and a lot of that is to the 100 Year history but a lot of it's also for the last couple of years what Brett and his team have been trying to do so I suppose you know that's when I really started looking um in Earnest again and I you know of course it was covid it was the pandemic and and we couldn't we couldn't meet we're doing it all through videos and um eventually I said look we're gonna have to meet here and and the United States of America wouldn't let me in and so we had to meet up in Toronto uh in an airport Hangar somewhere um so that was what that was when we met so it was you know 18 yeah well two years ago now under Brett he really focused on retention of employees and there was the kind of the Terminix turnaround Playbook where he wasn't going to go out and just buy a bunch of stuff and do what folks in the past have done I mean is is Brett's Playbook still in play now as part of running kill with the Terminix organization it is yeah it is I mean it's one of the the neat things about the the marriage arguably the neatest thing is because you know being a deal guy and having done a lot of merger type activity at my time quite often the financial case for the merger is made out of of synergies and savings it's all about you know how many heads can you cut this was different this is Terminix with the leading brand residential and Termite brand in North America with a big position in raising in a big position in termite and then here's rentokil who's got the leading Global position in commercial with a big brand in commercial so you've got these incredibly complementary fit and as we've gone into it in the you know bringing the businesses together Brett's position has been hate you know we're not going to try and tell you we think we know how to do commercial better than rental kill let's just take the rental kill Playbook and we'll adopt that and we've to a greater or less extent we've taken a very similar position with with resilient termite I mean termite we were always small in and Rezi it's only in America we're big in resi outside of the United States we do some really here in Australia and a few other but but it's not as big a markets we've always been the commercial uh outfit so by playing to each other's strengths and and letting um the natural leader lead the Playbook as you put it yeah absolutely so the answer is yes we're working very hard and then we we're trying to do best to breed we're trying to say yeah but have we got some stuff that we do that's better yeah let's bring that in and have have and they've got some stuff so we're we're sort of trying to make sure we we mesh the best of both but um the Terminix Playbook under breath is absolutely what we're implementing I can imagine that you know you mentioned the brand I mean clearly in North America Runner kill has for over a decade now been an amalgamation a variety of local brands of course run to kill the name is not nearly as known in North America's organ and Terminix so I got to imagine that the brand was an important aspect of this acquisition for you guys yeah look for me it comes back to what I was saying earlier in philosophy it was about people and yeah so you mentioned colic retention if I had a single thing that caused me to worry about putting the two organizations together and I'd get asked this all the time by investors you know what keeps you awake at night what are you concerned about colleague retention is the single one that I would I would put out there because back to my terrible story about the German comedian you know if you can't get people out of bed in the morning come to work or or if you can get them to come to work and then they leave you again in the next six months that's a really difficult hand to play and no matter what industry you're in so that for me was was really where my focus was much less about brand and all the other things and synergies that I knew that would be good in the question is could we together could we address that and make that better and I'm feeling you know really really good about that so the brand was yeah it's a wonderful brand it's got the best you know brand recognition in Pest Control uh of any brand in in the United States so um but yeah I know it's it is a wonderful it's a power brand as we call it how has the folks out in the field the front line colleagues dealt with this over recent months during the the integration I mean have you had any retention issues anyone you know Graves of Exodus because I don't like renekill or I don't like Terminix or no um it is funny though it's a funny old industry I think I suppose all Industries are the same I I had some one of the investors about three four months ago saying oh we hear people uh people are leaving the company and they well where are you here in that and oh well you know we're you know we're hearing that we're hearing it and that's a little bit and I tracked it down and you know it was like six people yeah and six people that we've invited you know made available to the market as they say no it's been good it's been it's been really good so colic retention is up um in both businesses and that takes some saying so Frontline colleague retention has improved needs to improve further um but that's improved management retention's great obviously we you do have to make changes when you bring big businesses together so some people have had to leave the company some of that has been voluntary most of it's been voluntary um but but nothing out of the usual so no I'm actually delighted with where we are on colic retention but it's still one of the biggest opportunities to get the overall Frontline colleague retention across the combined business up to the sort of levels that we want it to be I would say is is probably the single most important Focus for me over the next couple of years how have you dealt with you know the harmonization of comp structures across carefully um yeah well where we're at the moment is we've done a lot of work on the benefits piece outside of America people don't know what I'm talking about and you all know what benefits are but we don't use different language over here so with things like medical and dental things like paid time off things like all of the all the ancillary benefits we've done a big piece of work and we've moved on that already so we're well on the way to harmonizing benefits mentioned safety we've done things like them and they may seem like small things but safety shoes so rental colleagues had Safety Shoes Terminix colleagues didn't but of course we're going to give everyone the same the same with bee suits and other equipment so we've moved on those sort of uh ancillary things pay plan is in scope um but the answer to that question is carefully you don't miss we have pay plans in in group based businesses and Pest Control without a lot of care and attention and thought so we will be moving and we will be moving to a single uh pay plan but we'll do it carefully we've got a pilot going we'll get through that we'll learn from the pilot we'll make some changes and we'll move so but we're on track for where we expected to be we're not behind the plan but we're not rushing that we've got to get that right so um but yeah you've got to take care with it when you think about the fact that you guys own a huge chunk of North America now you know since the acquisition of Earth and more acutely starting around 2012 2013 you guys have been on somewhat of an acquisition Terror particularly in North America right yeah and you know I would imagine it's not been bad for you Paul it's been great that's why after our coffee at the end of the day here I'm buying you the point um but champagne you guys are going to be more selective I would imagine going forward in North America yeah look I think um as you say we we have been doing a lot of acquisition we're not the only ones of course you know our competitors have private equities gotten very busy in that space um but we've got a lot to do in the next two to three years we've got a lot to do to integrate uh across the the two businesses and that's going to keep us busy um but we're pacing ourselves we could Rush this we could say I'm going to crash it together in 18 24 months I don't think that would be a good plan so we're going to take 36 months to put together now at any one point in time that may mean that certain different parts of the business are cut tied you know they're just going to be so busy on that that we really shouldn't give them something else to do like integrate another business on the other hand big chunks of the business will either already have been integrated or not yet slated for integration for another 12 months which means we're going to have opportunities um what I'm not going to allow to happen um if there's a must-have asset out there and there's an asset that we've prized for years and we've been working on it for years and we know I'm not going to let that I'm not going to miss out on that because once it's gone it's gone um but it's just acquired by a financial smart system in which case you know we'll make an appointment now and then come see us in three to five years time I guess um but but if there are and we all know that sometimes they're more sort of nice to have yeah that's a good business but it doesn't you know it doesn't tick all of the boxes we'll probably pass on some of those in the towns or the cities where we're already incredibly busy must-have deals will do now if the must-have deal comes right on top of an integration we'll just we'll just incubate it we won't integrate it we'll run it as a separate business for a couple of years and then we'll come back and integrate it in a couple of years time so um look and then the other thing of course is we're in 93 countries around the world um and 92 at the moment there's some Terminix integration in a few markets you know Ireland Sweden Mexico Honduras that the vast majority of our markets we're you know totally open for doing acquisition so probably means we'll do a little bit more outside of the states outside North America and a little bit more in hygiene and well-being um while we're giving ourselves a little bit of space in the States but but as I say I'm not going to miss any must-have deals in in the US but you're kind of running out of inventory so to speak I mean there's a scarcity of Premium Assets Now in the pest control space I know they regenerate and all that but between anti-cmax and Rollins and Runner kill and now the it's you know Financial sponsor season you know there's not you know have these conversations with Alex all the time about the fact that even in North America you've got some old businesses you've got some interesting ones but you don't have the supply of quality assets that you once had just a few years ago I yes and no I mean you know I think you're right certainly at the top end we all look at PCT 100 right so at the top end of PCT 100 there's been an awful lot of activity by definition if you look at the bottom end of PCT 100 the smallest company in the PCT 100 is still significantly bigger than it was a few years ago so it is it is regenerating and many of the smaller ones will go on to be medium-sized ones and several of the medium-sized ones will go on to be great quality companies the other thing that that is worth remembering is the vast majority of companies that have come into the rental family when they were trading on their own we're probably doing 10 um operating margin yeah and when they come into a network like ours or our big competitors you still get a big opportunity to increase the margins just because all the density factors and and so they don't have to be you know the biggest they don't have to be operating at the top of the the pile they just have to be a good business with good people good customer base and so we can still there's still plenty of Runway but I agree you know by definitions a lot of deals have been done that won't be available to be done but there's still an awful lot you still got 18 to 20 000 pest control companies in the states and that's after a decade of consolidation so so I'll continue to be I think I think you'll you know I think you're all right if that was the purpose of your question I think you're all yeah you know since you've come on at run a kill you guys have focused on Innovation and Technology I think more so than any other player in the space and and I'm not just talking about you know Tech enabled Pest Control I'm talking about I mean I remember back when we did the vda deal that was the vector deal yeah and I remember sitting with John and sitting with Alex and we spent a couple of months going over it and John didn't want to do that deal you did and it was a you know they got the scientists and the lab coats they had very differentiated capabilities and it put rent to kill on the map as basically the larger largest provider of vector Disease Control in the world in addition to that you know most recently we did that deal in Israel so you know we talked about gun rights let's talk about the palestinian-israeli conflict so you guys officially entered Israel by an IPM Romans business which you know I got to spend a lot of time over there looking at his AI enabled you know Optics and all the things what is it with you in Innovation and technology and where where do you ultimately see yourself taking this business over time uh let me split that into two because I think technology is not necessarily the same thing as Innovation so let's start with tech all right um I like to try and keep things simple because I'm a genuinely I'm a simple guy I'm a small village all of that exactly yeah yeah okay story we'll move on but so I I say simply to my team why are we investing in technology what's the what's the reason why we're doing this keep it simple we invest in technology for one of two things we are either trying to make it more efficient more effective lower cost for us to provide the service to you so anything that we can do in the back of house that doesn't negatively impact your service but can lower our cost to serve has got to be a good thing and that's a that's a margin play more excitingly is any technology that we can use to give you a the customer a better service if we can give you a better service and ideally a service for which you value as a premium service then that's even better so if it doesn't meet one of those two criteria we're not doing it okay unless it's unless it's making us more efficient or it's giving us something neat and cool and Innovative to sell to customers on the Innovation side the thing with Pest Control you know it is a wonderful I always say it's the original subscription business before subscription businesses got trendy you know it is the gift that keeps on giving if you've got a contract with your customer if you deliver great service if you keep them happy keep them pest free solve their problems be easy to deal with be nice be transparent with your billing um then they should they should be staying with you yep they really they really should be so um now that will only take you so far the question is okay if you want to keep growing for us we think that the the differential is innovation Innovation is the lifeblood of organic growth that's that's our view that's only the we're coming up with new things to solve existing problems or we're coming up with new things to solve new problems and so um that's that's our view now increasingly that is a lens that you've got to put over the business in in terms of sustainability non-tox chemical three low energy consumption you've got these big themes now that again if my viewers if you're not innovating you're dead and and so um some of it is responding to what is happening in the big wide world some of it is trying to lead the industry and we are now you know by Far and Away the biggest player in the industry and and with that comes a responsibility and we think we've got to do some things differently in the industry um and for the benefit of the industry and some of that is to find new Solutions which which are um less burdensome on the planet so for us Innovation I will say Innovation is not a product and it's not a process it's a state of mind Innovation is you know are you open to new ways of working new ideas and whatever your job in the company is are you open to that in fact we encourage you to innovate and then share it with the rest of us and even when it's been a failure please share it with us because we won't then copy it somewhere else because we know you've already tried it so I think Innovation really is very very important um you look at you know as you talk about the the Israeli deal and um I was asked to do an interview with the financial times about three weeks ago I read the article well yeah but the interview has nothing to do with that the interview was all about M A it was all about tell us about deals and tell us about Terminix and at the very end of the the session the the uh generally said is there anything I should have asked you and I said I said you perhaps you could have asked about the most recent deal we did in Israel and I'm mentioned you know artificial intelligence for for rats and he said what what tell me about that and you know I told him a little bit the story became front front page of the ft and the weekend and then Sky TV called up and wanted an interview uh the guardian yeah it was it was sort of everywhere it's like just sort of makes a point really that I think people are interested in the latest technology and and people tend to think about Pest Control is not very Innovative well there's a lot of innovation going on in that space now whether you can monetize you know facial recognition for for rodents that's another debate for another day but the fact that you can do it and it will tell you about rodent Behavior and we all say with pest control but pest prevention is far more important than Pest Control if you can if you can prevent the problem before it becomes an infestation by seeing early where the issue is and where it's coming from then you're going to be a better pest controller so I think Innovation is incredibly important but some of it we do for a bit of a hang low effect to be the innovator some of it we do um really to come up with the solutions for the future you have your Innovation Center here in the UK and I understand you've got plans to build one in Texas is that right uh yeah we're we haven't quite announced it but we just have now in Dallas congratulations thanks for that Paul um so yeah no we're we're going to open an innovation Center for residential of a termite um based in Dallas and then we're going to have an extension of that in Mobile um Alabama for termite and so what does the Innovation Center do is it a bunch of scientists tooling around with you know mixes together I mean you've never been to 100 before you should come you should come to it Malcolm invited me out this time around and I just hadn't had the opportunity to do it and I I skipped The Innovation Center visits um when Ronan was doing that back in uh yeah a lot of what we're doing is um observing animal behavior okay if you can understand the behavior of in this case the rodents yeah but it extends also to termite Behavior Etc if you were trying to work out what do they do how do they you know if you can understand their habitat understand where where they live what their patterns of behavior are then you can start to anticipate in from a pest control or pest prevention point of view so in the UK one we have lots and lots of rats and lots of mice and we've got the largest collection of insects in Europe and then we've got a mosquito room you've got fly rooms so you're testing every ilt insect-like trap on the market so we test our competitors devices we test our own Innovation so we're trying to make sure that we can stand behind the claims that we make from an efficacy point of view is where the regulatory team sign off that it meets all the regulatory standards and obligations so yeah we have we have PhD scientists and technicians in the one in the UK we've we've based that where we also do a lot of our Frontline technician training okay so we get the text come in and they have great fun you know learning um but they also tell our scientists you don't suppose you've got a solution for this have you and they so we get some of the ideation coming from the front the front line pragmatist versus the yeah that's all very interesting but have you got something yeah right which is where tracking gel came from one of the texts said you know we all go in there and we've got this blue light and we're checking and we came up with this because one of the texts said yeah why can't you come up with a you know like a tracking gel so we could see exactly where they've been just put shine a light on that sort of thing so but it's you know I was in our tech center about four years ago and I was talking to the guy I was in charge of it and he was incredibly excited and he said you won't believe this we we've he said we've worked out that um fleas are attracted to a certain Spectrum of light and you know here's the Spectrum and I'm like well it is impressive I said can you tell me how much work we do for flea control uh sort of burst his bubble we're like no we don't really yeah there's not a market and so I have to be the you know the miserable guy says no we're not doing that because we do we'll only invest in things back to you know can it lower our costs or is it going to represent an exciting Market opportunity there's so many cool things that the scientists have come up with that we've said um that the Market's not big enough for that we won't make enough money but so we have to have this very hard Edge commercial side to decide what are we going to work on but that would be the same idea in in the new facility in in the States but we're going to focus there on resi and on termite and so over here in in the UK we'll focus on the commercial side we'll keep the rodent Center of Excellence over here in the UK and we'll be working more on flying biting crawling insects in in the states it was interesting doing the Israeli transaction but it made me start to think about how you guys grow around the world you know you've got pest control on your other business lines it appears to me that you try to identify a country that although it may be a little bit premature today it's got some promise yeah and you want to plan a flag there even if you you know I don't know make up a small country out in the middle of nowhere you buy a small business there and now you've got run a kill and you can grow as the economy grows and develops is that kind of your philosopher how do you yeah it's good it's a good point I mean I've mentioned earlier we are in 93 countries um so there's really two sorts of maybe three Acquisitions we look for and keep it simple to start with first one is density building Acquisitions in the cities in and it's very much a city-based game and you shouldn't thinking continents or countries think in cities when we went into Brazil we went into the top three cities rather than trying to get you know plant your pan uh Brazilian coverage so the first one is if it's a city we're already in can we find nice boltons because they give us density and that's wonderful so that's that's the easiest if you like um the second one you talked about planting Flags but so we have this thing called um cities of the future and we've worked out guest worked out not sure which of the cities are going to be mega cities in 2050. which are the countries that we think are going to have differential growth but within the countries which are the cities that we think are going to have differential growth because I because I pretty much can guarantee if you can show me a country with really good GDP growth I can show you cities will be growing faster than the average GDP and I can show you that Pest Control within those cities will be growing faster than the city GDP so you've got real opportunity for growth so for those countries we've got the list of the cities that we want to go after okay now within those cities can we find the best pest control company or the second or the third best but not the 50th best right can we find someone who's really really good that's got that local reputation they've probably been doing it for a few decades if we can win that we probably then change it to uh rental brand name and then we go back to category one let's okay now we've got the the first one can we get the second and the third and the fourth within that area because then we've got density if we're right we won't be right every time by 2050 we're going to have an incredibly profitable and very dense set of operations in a bunch of cities that frankly in 2050 will be very well known because they're mega cities whereas the day they're not quite as as well known which means it takes us into some territories that some other people will feel a little bit a little bit more queasy we've just gone into Pakistan I used to run my old business in my old company in Pakistan I know the country well Pakistan as a market is not for the faint-hearted you know we've gone into Lebanon and we've gone into Argentina and some of these will not be instantly successful overnight but if we get that densification urbanization fast GDP growth and and build up uh over time I think you know those will be incredibly exciting opportunities and that's what we're doing around the world but you've got to weather some storms I mean I think you guys closed that poker acquisition immediately prior to the government issues in Lebanon you know lights turning off and yeah yeah and look some of the markets you you could there'll always be a reason for not doing it yeah I'm in Argentina I've been looking at Argentina for you know 15 years and I'm not sure not sure not sure and we've gone in and because now it's looking a bit Yeah but it'll be all right it'll be all right if you if you take your time Horizon out to you know 2050. these will be successful even if a few are not successful than the majority are the value creation opportunity on the majority dwarfs the one or two that are not successful so you have to be you know you have to be prepared to accept that you're not going to roll six sixes as my old boss used to say you're never going to get it right all of the time but if you're so concerned about the downside you'll never make any progress there at all so I think that that's the approach we've we've taken and I think we can only be judged on that one in about 10 or 20 years time not in the next you know six or 12 months but I actually think that will be um incredibly exciting and and again these are markets not every time but but very often these are markets where there's less competition down there so I wouldn't see too many people knocking on the doors in Pakistan when we were down there in terms of our normal competitors um which which I think is also interesting as well so it gives us you know gives us some opportunity to build scale in those markets perhaps a little bit more easily than in the markets where we're butting up against the union absolutely characters you know being a publicly traded company oftentimes executive Management's focused on the near term you know it makes a lot more sense in the near term today to go out and do incremental deals and cities you know that on the necessity players right yeah whereas here at renukil I mean you guys are clearly doing those but you're also saying okay let's look out 10 15 20 30 years and start to plant these seeds now which I don't see many others are doing yeah and look I mean I've already done two jobs in my I did 20 years at the last couple and 15 years so far at this one so I'm a long-term I'm a long-term thinker unfortunately you're a PLC or a public company you've got to do both yeah you've got to do both because if if all you're doing is the short term stuff then one day that might run out yeah so you better be better been thinking on the medium in the long term so I think it is important that you you do the boat you can do both of them I'd be interesting if you know if I'm fortunate enough to have another you know 20 30 years on the planet and I look back at my time at rental I I wouldn't be surprised if the thing that the biggest achievement will actually be the global footprint that we will have built and the technology that we will have built as much as the positions in the existing markets that we built today so I think you need you need both as you enter new markets is Pest Control always the edge of the wedge or are you also looking on you know sometimes you enter on a hygiene side most of the time it's passed um you know I've talked to you before and I'm on a mission to convince the stock markets at that hygiene business should be valued at a similar rating to the pest control um but they lead the lead entry in nearly all of our markets has been passed occasion occasionally hygiene but hygiene with pests on the side sometimes as opposed to pests with hygiene on the side but it's nearly always passed so I mean how big is hygiene as from a market perspective versus Pest and typical from a global market yeah I was waiting it's almost impossible to answer that question because past you can it's an industry and you can say was hygiene is such a broad Church it covers so many things I mean you wouldn't know that we have a we have a dental hygiene business that that um you know that tube you put in your mouth and all the rubbish that comes and goes down the tube well that goes into a machine in a filter and we provide the filters and then we take the filter and we reprocess the gunk to get the precious metals back out of that and then we get golden Palladium and all that you wouldn't imagine that's a business that we're in it's a business that we're in um when the gold price is high we make out very well when it's low we don't do so well so we've got lots and lots of adjuncts to hygiene so it makes it really quite difficult to answer the question how big is the market but what you see in in hygiene is a very very fragmented Market you don't see you've got syntax in the states you've got CWS Boca in Europe but you don't have many big big players other than us um and which is kind of what makes it exciting and in a post-pandemic oh this is a world where we are more concerned about hygiene whether it's air hygiene surface hygiene it is an opportunity so we're you know we're putting a lot of effort in there we've not spent as much in the m a space by a long way as we have in pest control but there is an opportunity to continue to build that and there's would you say there's as much opportunity in hygiene from an acquisition perspective as there isn't past is that is that you asking as a broker or or is that um I'm just I'm curious because you know the analysts talk about this all the time right and I actually get these questions and I don't know anything about hygiene but you know they ask me yeah like you know Andy's always talking about it being the new past what is this how does it work it it's hard work to build through acquisition just because there aren't many medium-sized players yeah there's there's a gazillion small players there isn't a town or or a city in the world in the developed world that doesn't have a high number of hygiene players but it means it's a very slow process you know you'd have to buy buy City and and you know if you could find a a national player then that would make things go a lot faster but we to be honest we've been much more selective going after Pest and then side of plate yeah there's a nice hygiene there's a nice hygiene one but as I said earlier if if we do slow things a little bit in uh 23 24 and Pest Control United States it means we will push a bit harder on the hygiene opportunity um outside of the states over the next few years so there's an opportunity for sure radical sheds some service lines over the years do you you know outside of pest and hygiene do you focus spend any time internally talking about like hey maybe we should get into this maybe we should get into that you know you think about like Orkin running lawn care in the U.S yeah it's a small amount but you know Terminix of course was an amalgamation of a bunch of things under service master what we would look for and what we do look for is it's got to be route based density business it's got to be a business that has um a regulatory requirement the wonderful thing about pest control and certain in commercial environments is if you don't have Pest Control you can lose your license or you can be prosecuted Etc um so there's a regulatory component a density component there's got to have some barrier to entry yeah and zero barriers to entry lawn I think is a zero about a zero variant to entry uh example so there are some in in in the sort of close by spaces and you gave a couple of examples um you know Vector isn't Pure Play Pest Control um but is it is a nice contiguous space you know weed management that sort of thing Lake management is another one so yeah we're always looking and scoping it's easier to see what those areas are in hygiene than it is in Pest Control um but yeah we've we've got a few um irons and a few fires yeah when you look around the world now we've got some potential dark clouds on the horizon from an economic perspective right you know yeah interest rates ratcheting up you've got well we've all watched the news about what's going on here in recent months in the UK yeah what sort of you know clearly Pest and hygiene are extremely recession resilient and you were around back in the great financial crisis yes I mean I think Runner kill has done a great job I remember when covet came out you guys got out in front of this very very quick what sort of conversations do you have with your team about what might be coming down the pike from an economic perspective yeah I mean I think it it is interesting Kobe is not a bad example of you in a global business you can see the impacts in some cases happening before they've happened in your backyard so in covid we could see China and Hong Kong and Taiwan and that was one of the reasons we were able to Pivot so quickly because they said everyone's going around in white suits yeah you know spraying disinfection okay right that that means we can think about that um in terms of in terms of um you know recession I think jury's out on that one as well as the weather whether we're actually going to have recession I don't think we're going to have a broad-based deep recession in the way that people were concerned about 12 months ago even in this country which I would say of all of my 93 this is the toughest economic this is why you got month the other day it's tough out here at the moment yeah it was a former teacher it was out of work yeah so even here I don't I don't think we're necessarily headed for recession and you know the stock markets like if you think about it from a stock market point of view the stock market will be the first to see past these economic conditions so the stock market's already beginning to think maybe we're seeing seeing calling the end of this calling the you know our interests can I get you anything else to drink it's been an end of a long day and even when we have a point if you're buying um yeah yeah that'd be nice pint times two yeah yes brilliant I'll bring them over fantastic thanks um yeah so so as we as we look I would say the North American economy is holding up um you know conditions are tougher but it's holding up pretty well um Europe Germany's wobbling uh France is holding up Better Than People expected even the UK I think is is you know you can begin to see that maybe we're seeing passes I think you know the the rates of inflation uh falling interest rates are probably close to their Peak they may go up a little bit more so we have to work out how to trade through that for the next probably 12 months and then then you know what happens on the other side there will be a rebound so I think for us you know we haven't we haven't the the the danger I think is to is to fall into the Trap of of suddenly switching into ah you know yeah it's exactly and so you don't want to I don't think you want to do that you want to be able to trade through I said we were the original pest is the original subscription business we've taken the position on price that that we will try to recover input cost inflation through price not to gain an advantage on our customers but to recover our input cost inflation and as we see those input costs beginning to Abate then our position on pricing will Abate accordingly but the last 12 18 months we've done a very very good job on recovering input cost inflation and you I think you can see that you know beginning to to come off a little bit so I'm supposed to I'm on the bullish side of where the economy is going not because I think the next 12 months are going to be particularly easy I don't think they will be but I think life after that you can begin to see where the recovery comes from so our viewers has don't you know don't start cutting down to the muscle don't start you know and I've seen other companies that they back off on things like training we've never backed off on training even in after 2008 you always invest in people and always invest in the growth side of the business but you just have to be a little bit more a bit smarter about where you where you put your Capital to work in the in recessionary times but I'm reasonably bullish if I'm honest yeah switching topics here is something more interesting you know I I wrote that note about your Taylor Swift uh Swifty did you read that little poem that little sonnet I I read everything that you put out yeah cheers thank you Joe thanks enjoy those thank you very much she's full cheers Andy yeah so I don't know if Brett's really a Swifty or he was saying that to try to be cool let's be very very clear my kids think this is madness so how'd this all come about oh I don't know I mean I'm I'm I do listen to a lot of music and um normally when I go to the gym and I just put stuff that I like on and and then I guess I've always quite liked Taylor Swift going back and I'm all those years when she when she was country and all the rest of it but I had this this this shocking statistic during lockdown one I got the thing from Spotify and it said at the end of the year that I was in the top 0.5 of uh swifters you know people listening to Taylor Swift you beat out millions of teenage girls right exactly exactly which is which is a tragic thought and then the and then 12 months later they sent me another email saying I was now in the top 0.25 I'm in the top quarter which is um really really a strategy I took my daughter um to uh Wembley you know football stadium when Taylor Swift played three years ago I remember I went to The Gents I went to the urinals and the urinals in Wembley is is huge I mean it goes on it's a wall of I was the only person in the gents I mean basically there were not many middle-aged men you know with prostate conditions uh you know going to a Taylor Swift concert but yeah no I just I you know what can I say I I I love to think so here you didn't pick you up and say what are you doing here buddy it was worse than that because I actually took a photo of it to post it to my family and say look how sad is this I'm the only bloke at the concert but I don't know what I continue really it's um she comes from Reading Pennsylvania which of course is where uh rental comes from Ehrlich erlich land so um yeah that's I can't make that as an excuse me no you can't I'll take it today it's fantastic and speaking of the beer this is what do you call this guy Richie's Boozer this is Guy Richie's Loser yeah the great guy Richie I'd never heard the term Boozer until this morning is that all right it's first time yeah yeah is anywhere you've been then no I guess I've stayed away from the booze um you know guy and riches right indeed I can't understand any any of the films I don't know what people are talking about exactly then you've understood them gypsies what are you doing Potter yeah you can't really understand much of what is being said you tell me they are proper um sort of East End villain type movies and and we love them what's your favorite guy Richie film um probably Lock Stock like it's not Two Smoking Barrels outstanding film but I I do love the gentleman which is the which is the most recent world big movies so I'm not sure health warning the language in that film is pretty shocking but um I do love it he's some yeah so he's he's quite the character who was married to uh your very own I lived in in well not so far from here but yeah no he's a very cool character and just been talking to the barman who said he does come in here from time to time so I'm waiting any minute now for him to join us we might have a better chance to get Taylor Swift in here well you could do that as well you could do that as well and if you can get me a couple of tickets um I'm sure with your with your contacts but let's see what we can do there we go it's been great catching up with you it's always good to see you yeah it's been really good I've enjoyed it so um glad you're having time and a good time in London apart from getting uh Marmot yeah yes Cheers Cheers thank you foreign just do it again with the film in this time