The 36-year-old third-generation retailer (his great uncle and his father ran Great Universal Stores) spent the day at Next’s unglamorous headquarters on the outskirts of Leicester.
By 11am Wolfson had not got round to reading the huge pile of press cuttings on his desk. Had he been bothered, he would have discovered that he was retailing flavour of the month: not that this is an entrepreneur in danger of believing his own press.
“These are only six months’ results. You have got to remember that it’s only two years since we had our last mistake. All retailers are going to have ups and downs,” said Wolfson in a rare interview.
Six months or not, last week’s results were impressive — propelling shares in Next to a new record high and putting a £4.1 billion value on the firm that nearly went bust in the 1980s. The company had beaten City expectations, with a £163.2m pre-tax profit and a 15% growth in sales in the six months to the end of July — at a time when rivals are whingeing about poor weather and a consumer slowdown.
Iain McDonald, the retail analyst at Numis, described the results simply: “Superb”.
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Tony Shiret, an analyst at CSFB, said: “The profit and share-price performance are his testament. Wolfson has been very successful.”
And, whatever Wolfson may say, last week’s interim results were no one-off. Under both Wolfson and David Jones, the former chief executive who rescued Next after its over- expansion in the 1980s and stepped up to chairman in 2002, Next has seen its dominance of the high street grow.
According to Verdict Research, a retail consultancy, Next’s share of the womenswear market has risen from 4.1% in 1997 to 6.7% in 2003. Over the same period M&S has seen its market share fall from 16.7% to 13.5%.
The reign of Wolfson and Jones (who worked for Simon’s father and has been a big influence on Wolfson Jr) has proved profitable for shareholders.
According to analysts, Next has, in part, profited from the disarray at Marks & Spencer, the UK’s largest high-street retailer.
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Edward Whitefield, chairman of Management Horizons, a retail strategy and operations firm, said: “They had already established clear momentum but they have benefited from the problems at M&S. There has been an almost direct transfer of market share.”
But Next’s success over the past decade has been about more than just weak competition. Whitefield claims that the design-led culture that now dominates at Next has been the key.
“There is great commitment to design and the development of new products,” he said. “There has been a huge investment in product design and fabrics.”
Whitefield also cites the close relationship between Next and its manufacturers. “They are almost vertically integrated,” he said.
Wolfson is certainly proud of the product. On Wednesday he was, as usual, dressed from top to toe in Next clothes.
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“It comes down to the product. That is what customers come for. You have got to deliver great products at great prices. If you have got the right product at the right time, customers will come,” he said. “Ultimately it is the product that makes a brand. Not the brand that makes the product.”
Shiret, one of the City’s leading retail analysts, says Next trades more aggressively than rivals and points out that its systems allow managers at larger stores to restock the shelves three or four times a day.
Whitefield, too, says the retailer’s systems allow it to react faster than its rivals. “Within days of a line being introduced managers can calculate whether it’s going to be a bestseller,” he said.
Based far from the retail heartland in west London also means that Next is focused on its business — not other people’s. This is, after all, a company with a simple mantra:
“If it shifts frocks, we’ll do it; if it doesn’t, we won’t.”
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The philosophy means you will never see Next directors speaking at industry conferences. It also means that Wolfson rarely attends the numerous industry events so enjoyed by other chief executives in the close-knit world of retailing.
The Leicester headquarters includes mock shops where buyers can see how items will look on the shelves.
“The company’s buyers are more like product or brand managers than traditional buyers,” said Whitefield. “There’s no divide between the buying and retail sides of the business.”
The structure has allowed Next to react quickly to the mistakes that are almost inevitable in the competitive world of fashion retailing.
Nevertheless, a number of City and retail observers warn of challenges ahead. Richard Hyman, chairman of Verdict, a retail analyst, argues that the brand could become too ubiquitous — after all, no woman wants to be seen wearing the same dress as someone else.
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Wolfson insists that there is no danger, yet, of the group becoming too big. “At the moment market share is not a constraint on growth,” he said.
And even while the Next share price continues to soar, a growing number of analysts warn that a revived M&S could hurt Next. Wolfson himself points out that the current benign environment — as he describes it — has to get tougher at some point.
But it is hard to imagine either Wolfson or Jones surrendering without a fight the market share they have worked so hard to get from M&S.