Jochen Zeitz Quotes

Sustainability is no longer about doing less harm. It's about doing more good.

If you look at the state of our planet, the next generations won't be around if we consider sustainability as a gimmick.

Every time a new CEO came, I got a promotion till I was made CEO myself.

I believe in metaphysics. I don't believe in God because I think that is a human simplification of the things we can't explain. But I believe in a greater universe.

I always wanted to be a medical doctor, and I never thought of business.

Obviously, South Africa is our most important market, but we are also gradually increasing our presence throughout East and West as well as North Africa. It is a continent with a lot of potential which we plan to tap into.

I believe in 'business has a force for good.' You know, business has an impact on society. Of course, it creates jobs. It creates prosperity, but on the other hand, we also leave a negative footprint behind.

Puma is a brand deeply rooted in sporting lifestyle.

When I joined in 1990, as they say in the sport of sailing, Puma was in the doldrums. It was a difficult time, and Puma had gone to sleep.

We should bring in an environmental attitude, and I think luxury should automatically be about sustainability and quality.

The B Team can catalyse initiatives.

Looking at Mount Kenya in the morning is a holistic experience. I go back at least once a year.

I think South Africa has shown it can host such a big event as the World Cup, so why not hold the Olympics at some point in Africa? Maybe not just in one country but in a host of countries.

The problem is you can't wear your old shoes too often because people say, 'You're still wearing that shoe?'

I haven't been hunting for years. It is just a tradition I grew up with.

When I became CEO, I just didn't think about my age too much. I'm sure many people did think that my age mattered, but I didn't. That was probably because of my age.

Puma was all about function and not at all about design. The founder of the company always believed functionality and performance were the only ingredients that could make Puma successful and design never mattered.

When I started at Puma, you had a restaurant that was a Puma restaurant, an Adidas restaurant, a bakery. The town was literally divided. If you were working for the wrong company, you wouldn't be served any food; you couldn't buy anything. So it was kind of an odd experience.

I'm trying to go beyond the traditional cliches of an African safari.

We need to engage rather than educate people.

In Africa, you can make three acres sustainable relatively easily, but 50,000 acres? It's not about picking up towels or sleeping in a tent.

I just don't like to talk about the past.

Being able to dedicate 100 per cent of my time to impacting more businesses without being operational, it just gives me a bigger platform.

Look at timber prices in the late '90s, at around $50. If you count the true damage of cutting down forests, the resultant flooding, insurance claims, and so on, then the timber price should have been $100.

If we look at pricing holistically, we'll create a more solid business.

The old way of doing 'good business' was based on the principle, 'the ends justifies the means.' In the future, good business will invoke 'the means justifying the ends.' The E P&L can already serve as an important tool to help this shift in commerce from generating profits with collateral damages to profits with collateral benefits.

We're trying to find a tourism model that allows communities to thrive while business prospers.

We decided that sports, lifestyle and fashion were three elements that could be mixed together to a very unique formula. That's what we did: make Puma a very sports-fashion brand when, at the times, everybody talked about sports and sports performance and functionality. We said, 'Well, it's about more.'

We believe that African football is among the best in the world and very much characterized the Puma brand mentality, which is to win.

When it came to the discussion about would Harley do an electric bike, I said, 'Absolutely - this is a no-brainer.' Let's define the sound of the future.

We have to find alternative ways of producing our raw materials without asking nature to do it for us.

We allow people to be creative. We set a direction, we set the vision, we set the strategy, but within that framework, we allow our people to be as creative as they want to be.

As much as I like to explore the world, I explore music - from classical to rock.

When you are small, and you have to try and prove yourself, it is tough. When others are catching up and copy you, that's tough. We constantly need to change ourselves to stay ahead of the game.

If we bring together the right people, communities can flourish and wildlife can survive alongside them.

I was actually accepted into medical school in Italy. But then I wanted to come back and learn medicine in Germany. And while waiting, I decided to join a business school. I figured it would be useful for doctors to know some business as well!

Be curious enough to keep an open mind to what's happening around you in society. You can look at yourself and the world at the same time.

Business needs to push the agenda rather than waiting for it to happen.

We should eat less meat - all of us - and we should use less leather. I mean, that's reality.

I'm building Segera to promote a different way of doing tourism.

Resources are being destroyed, and if you don't have resources, you can't do business.

Walking out into the bush still feels the same as when I first came to Kenya in 1989, on the day the Berlin Wall came down.

I'm a curious person, and I always like to test new waters, and I've always jumped into the cold water and then started to think about how to swim.