Before we get into today's episode, a quick ad for Artly, the supplement company that I started with my husband Ben, who if you don't know is a four-time Olympic gold medalist. So, lots to live up to on the performance front in our household. Now, back when he was racing, I watched Ben's routine and thought, "Hang on a minute. I'm working as hard as he is, not as an athlete of course, but still juggling a never-ending to-do list. Why does his energy never look anything like mine?" Having talked to so many high performers on this podcast, one thing kept coming up again and again: recovery. So, I looked at what Ben was actually doing. Four Olympic golds, a performance team who'd built his whole day around what he took in the morning and what he took at night. That protocol has become night powder and day powder: third-party tested, screened for over 250 banned substances, used by the Emirates GBR SailGP team, the America's Cup team, Olympians, Paralympians, award-winning even. And we take both every night and every day, not because we own the company, but because we've got a Monday that starts at 6:00 and doesn't stop, and we need to do it all over again on Tuesday. Now, Performance People listeners can get 50% off their first four weeks. All you have to do is visit artlyartly.com/pod. Right, let's get into it.
Well, one of the things that's interesting is what is a success? I mean, in sport it's clear: you won. But it isn't in my business. What is success? You sold a million, you sold half a million, you sold 10 million—you know, what is success? I don't know. I think there's nothing worse than being satisfied. Happy is a different point, not just happy because of success; striving to succeed makes you happy.
You're now a part owner of a serious sporting entity in Bath Rugby Club. Exciting plans ahead then?
Plans is the wrong word. I'm the sort of person who observes and thinks and waits to see what the opportunities are. No, I did it because, you know, I want to help. And if we can build a wonderful stadium right in the center of Bath like a coliseum, that would be wonderful for the city. But also, you know, I wanted to make sure Bath thrives long-term.
You obviously want to protect the legacy and the heritage and everything else that comes with this wonderful opportunity that is Bath. There must also be things that you look at it for and think, "Oh, I can really help there." What are those things? So, James Dyson, thank you very much for having me back and for putting a plate of strawberries in front of me, which I know are rightly picked, and not just rightly picked, but picked by robots.
Picked by robots. And that's very interesting cause they have to look at it with a camera, so it's very much visual interpretation. And then they pick it, they snip it. A human has to use their thumbnail, which is quite painful, I must say, after you've done a million strawberries. So it takes the strawberry and it puts it into a well-lit little sort of box and looks at it all around with cameras. Cause when it's picking it, it can't see all the way around; it can see about 2/3 of it. And so if it likes it, it puts it in the punnet. If it doesn't like it, it drops it into a bucket.
And you were telling me as well before we started the podcast that you can tell a perfectly ripe strawberry by what?
Well, it's David Bowie haircut, when the leaves stick upwards from the top, like that.
That is amazing, isn't it? I don't know why I don't know that. Well, I suppose you'd ask the question, why would we know that?
Well, I didn't know that till now.
How much did you know about a strawberry before you started to farm it?
Absolutely nothing at all.
So, what was it about a strawberry that compelled you to sort of go on that journey?
Well, we were making green electricity cause it's one of the things that—well, the only crop, if you like to call it a crop, that makes any money. No crops make any money. If you make green electricity and put it into the grid, you can make a little bit of money. Most of the money is made by the people who bill you, who have nothing to do with electricity at all, they just bill the bill. That's a by-the-by.
So, we grow crops, usually maize, rot it down, create gas, and use the gas to drive generators. Effectively, it's massive diesel engines, but they're driven by gas. Now, you get 60% electricity out of that, which you put into the national grid, and 40% is heat, waste heat. Engines get hot and cooling them requires a lot of work. So, we're using that to dry grain, which is fine, but you can't dry grain all year round, it's only a short process. So, we thought, what can we do with this waste heat? Well, we can put it in greenhouses. What can we grow in greenhouses? And strawberries came up as a good idea. So, the vision is that we can grow strawberries all year round grown in Britain, and so you don't have to import them—no air miles and no truck miles. So, they're incredibly fresh. We get them to customers the next day after picking, all year round. Isn't that a great thing to do?
So, we started getting interested in strawberries and had to learn about strawberries. We built a very big glasshouse; the first one was about 15 acres of glass. Big investment, which is an issue with farming. And then we pump the heat in. We've got any electricity we need for infrared lights if we don't get enough sunlight, particularly during the winter; we've got that free, as it were, from our anaerobic digester. And we are growing about 6 million strawberry punnets a year at the moment. I'm about to nearly double that.
But, I have to say it's circular farming because the waste from the digester goes back on the land as fertilizer. We collect water on the roof of the glasshouse, which provides the water we need. So, it is true, sustainable circular farming. And the result is you get these wonderful strawberries, which you've got to taste, by the way.
Yeah, they look perfect, and I'm imagining they're delicious, and I'm going to take them all home.
You're welcome to take them home. I mean, the point is I suppose I knew nothing really about farming. I was passionate about it cause I'd grown up on farms in Norfolk. My friends had farms, and I used to go and sell sacks of potatoes, but I used to pick blackcurrants and top and tail Brussels sprouts and take parsley to the Campbell's soup factory in King's Lynn. So, I worked on the farm, so it was in me. So, when I was able to, I wanted to start buying farms. But I knew nothing about it, but once you get involved, you start to see opportunities.
"Ah, we can grow groats, we can sell electricity. That might make money, whereas growing wheat and sugar beet doesn't make money. Growing peas doesn't make money. That might make money," and indeed it does make a little bit of money. But then you see we're wasting the heat, so what can we do with the heat? So, we end up making money out of strawberries. So, we have money out of electricity, we have money out of strawberries. For the first time, farming can make a little bit of money. The sad thing is that it's a huge investment. Farmers don't have that kind of capital to invest in farming.
You talk about spotting the opportunity in it, though, which brings me to the reason why I guess we're sat here in the first instance, which is to talk about you're now an owner, part owner of a serious sporting entity in Bath Rugby Club. So, there must have been moments where you looked at that and thought, "I want to cross that threshold from fandom into supporting an opportunity in other ways—ways in which you can see you can help that club thrive and flourish as it moves forward." Talk to me about your passion for rugby. Where did that start?
Well, I played it at school. I tried one club game after school, and I realized I was the wrong physiognomy. It was all the more right at school cause school rugby is much gentler. And I was tall and I could jump, so I was quite useful in the lineout. And I was a long-distance runner, so I could always be sort of where the ball was; I had stamina. But apart from that, I wasn't much good at it, but I loved it. And it's a very free-running game. It's fast. It's brutal. But it's incredibly skillful. And what I really like about it is anyone of any physiognomy—except perhaps mine, unless I was fast; if I was a three-quarters, I suppose my physiognomy would survive—so people of different shapes and sizes can take part in it and be really good at it. And it's one of the few sports where that's true.
And each brings a different type of skill. So it's multi-skilled, not single-skilled. It's very fast. It uses your brain, your hands, your whole body. And when you watch it on television or live, apart from the sort of boring bit where they're doing the scrums, which is pure grunt, it's a very exciting and lively sport. And I started watching at Bath. And Bath have historically been a very exciting team, so I was lucky to have that as my local team.
I suppose you've been on that journey with Bath because they have been on quite a momentous journey.
Early '80s, I mean I was watching with Stuart Barnes and Jeremy Guscott in the '80s. I was very lucky. I mean, imagine little Bath having what is effectively the England team.
International team locally. And I was very, very lucky. And there are periods where it hasn't done so well. And Bruce Craig came along. So, Bruce put a huge amount of energy and money and all the right thinking, and he's got a very good rugby brain into making it successful. And that's been a journey in itself. And we came along as a sponsor about 10 or 12 years ago, and we've been sponsoring it for that time. So, I got much more interested in it because we were sponsoring.
Tell me about the first time you sort of stood on the terraces where you went to go and watch Bath play. Do you remember those days? Cause I think as all young people, when you turn up at your first sporting live event, the frisson of excitement and the enormity of it all and the fans chanting and everyone getting into it and behind it—was that something that deeply sort of resonated and connected with you?
Yes, because I think the Bath fans are very special. I mean, everybody would say that, but Bath has, funnily enough, a huge appeal outside Bath. People from Southampton, from Surrey, all over the place. And I'm told they're the only team that can fill Twickenham in a cup final. And because, you know, it's the sport in Bath. Bath is a rugby city. And if you live in it, you can't help but get caught up in that.
Back in the '80s, as we've already said, they had some extraordinary players. And it was the amateur era; it wasn't the professional era. So, these are people who were solicitors or chauffeurs or bricklayers or farmers. And so you're seeing international rugby played in Bath by amateurs. It was a fantastic privilege. I mean, I'd have been mad not to have gone there.
And then your mates are there as well.
Yes, I mean that's very true.
The camaraderie between the supporters is great.
Before we carry on, a teeny tiny favor from me to ask of you. If you like what you hear or see in this episode, please can you subscribe to our channels? It makes all the difference to have your support. It means the algorithms pick that up and send it to everyone else who gets something from this episode, too. Plus, of course, it means we can get the very best guests in the studio. Thank you.
It's interesting. We were speaking to a chap called Shaun Harvey, who's one of the directors at Wrexham Football Club. And he was talking about how it's one of the things that you can do as a family together, that any arguments or any niggles or anything just dissipate for that sort of hour and a half to two hours that you're all present in that space as fans and ticket holders of your sort of club that you're all behind and you back and you love and you've got that in common. And it's something that binds and bounds all of you together. Is that how you feel rugby is for your family? Does it extend beyond you, and does it improve you?
Very much so. My children and my grandchildren are there watching it, so it's a lovely time to meet them and to share something with them. But it's much more than that for me, cause you see people in Bath—I mean, they're strangers, I recognize some of them—but you're all enjoying the same thing and getting a thrill out of the same thing and having it to look forward to. And when you get a loss, you know, it's dreadful and you can't sleep the next night and all that sort of thing. So you're sharing that. It's a real sense of community, which people keep talking about, but you're really seeing it.
Have you felt that more keenly since you've been involved in the ownership side of it?
Yes, I lose more sleep at nights and get more disappointed. And sometimes the games aren't much fun if they're particularly close ones; they're not good for the heart. But the other thing is that it brings huge numbers of people to the city—to the city hotels, the city pubs, the city restaurants. And people often make a weekend of it: "Oh, we're going to an away match against Bath. Let's go and stay the weekend," or, "Let's go and watch Bath and stay the weekend."
And I think it's very interesting: in France, you have these huge stadia in the cities that are provided by the city, which they do the football and the rugby on it. And that means you get big crowds, which means a club, a football club or a rugby club in that town, has the huge revenue from a very large crowd.
I went down to Bordeaux the other day—40,000 people. 40,000 people paying £100 or whatever for a ticket, you know. The French rugby club could be rich. An English rugby club finds it very tough. I mean, when you consider the wealth that the rugby club brings to the city, you would think there would be more support from the city.
Yeah, that's a good point. That's true.
It sort of saddens me slightly. But anyway, that's part of the reason when I was offered the ownership that I took it up, because it needs money, needs people and capital to make it survive and make it grow much more.
Yeah, and not just one club. I think also definitely the feedback I've had since your ownership was made public is that actually what does that do for lots of different rugby clubs in terms of what is the message that that's sending that people who are strategic investors are prepared to put money behind these sporting franchises. Are you getting that sort of feedback as well? Is that what you're feeling, that there is a wave of interest now?
I didn't do it for that reason. I don't really expect to get a return, if that's what you're implying. No, I did it because, you know, I want to help. I think what the club and Bath is very special cause the ground is in the center of the city—a world heritage city, Georgian city with the Abbey right next to Pulteney Bridge with shops on the bridge, right by the river. It's the most extraordinary setting. And if we can build a wonderful stadium right in the center of Bath like a coliseum, that would be wonderful for the city and the community. But also, you know, I wanted to make sure Bath thrives long-term.
My sons are very keen on it, and they'll take over it from me. Well, they already are actually. So I hope that it will secure a long-term future of Bath Rugby, and it's nice to share it with Bruce Craig, who's the original owner, cause it is quite a lot for one private person to take on.
I suppose that is a good point. Does sharing the pressure of that and actually the responsibility of that helpful, especially—
Sharing the losses, if there are losses, and sharing the stadium—the cost of the new stadium, which is enormous, sharing that. We're bringing women's rugby into a mainstream part of what the club does, and that costs money. So I don't blame him wanting to share it, and I'm very happy that I'm only sharing it because I was a sponsor for a long time, and Bruce is a friend, and we sat next to each other in matches and so on. And then suddenly he said—I didn't expect it at all—he said, "Would you like to buy half of it?" And I said, "Yes, of course I'd love to."
Did you ever have a moment's hesitation or was it—
No, not at all, not at all. And the children were very excited. I shouldn't call them children.
They're young adults. They're well, they're older.
They're older adults now.
No, they were excited, too. So, it was a good thing to— Everything you do, you bring innovation to, because obviously that is in your blood. It runs through your veins, and that is where you see things from as well. So, you obviously want to protect the legacy and the heritage and everything else that comes with this wonderful opportunity that is Bath Rugby Club. But there must also be things that you look at it for and think, "Oh, I could really help here, and we could really innovate here, and if we just did that here, that could really change the dial." What are those things?
Well, I don't really work like that.
That's just how my brain is operating.
It'd be incredibly arrogant of me. I know nothing about rugby; let's start at that point. But I think there will be suggestions that come from people and ideas that you can see as time goes by. I mean, that's what happened with the strawberries: the strawberry idea didn't come along until about 10 years after I bought the first farms. So, sometimes they take a while to gestate, and sometimes they come along quickly.
My vacuum cleaner idea came because I was vacuuming. Vacuuming as a child, I found it frustrating, and then I bought my own house and had a family and so on, and eventually after several years of family life with a vacuum cleaner, I realized how horrible it was. I hope I'm someone who is curious and sees opportunities rather than someone who has grand ideas. I don't really have that, and how can I have grand ideas? But I'm sure that technology and certainly medics will have a big part to play in sport and in particular in rugby, I think, because they're so likely to get injured. So, I think developing physique, developing medicine, improving medical ideas, all this kind of thing, diet—all these things will have a big part to play.
And I suppose tech in things like data gathering, so you have the information with which to then make those sort of informed choices about what needs to be invested in in order to protect your assets, which are your players.
AI has a big part to play, and the speed of it.
Cause sport's all about speed. And then there's the psychologist part, which is really interesting. And I think we have a lot to learn there. Why is it that someone gets a big win one day and then loses when it should have won the next day? What is it? Complacency? Lack of will to fight? What is it? So, I think there are so many unanswered questions and so many opportunities to improve it from a science and engineering point of view in the weight training. All those weights, are they doing the right things?
Yeah, one of the things that I'm completely preoccupied by at the moment is the lack of female data that's available to draw any conclusions from, cause historically so much has been based in male understanding on male data. So, exciting plans ahead then, presumably, for your involvement in that world of rugby, not just as a fan, but also as an owner, but also preserving the—
Plans is the wrong word. I'm the sort of person who observes and thinks and waits to see what the opportunities are. And I'm sure lots of people have lots of suggestions as well. But you can see that we're just at the beginning, and we're just at the beginning of a professional sport. It's relatively recently they've become professional, so it's got a lot to learn, whereas American sport, for example, is far, far more advanced. But, I also think that rugby is going to grow as a sport.
I mean, I heard a statistic—I don't think it's been quite proven yet—is that more girls are taking up rugby than boys in the Bath/Bristol area. But certainly it's parity, which is interesting in its own right.
Yeah, I wonder why that is. There is, like you say, a growing interest. And also, I suppose what it will have to do is adapt with formats. There are different formats that are being played out in different sports. And rugby might be looking at that as well, I suppose, as an opportunity to widen its reach.
What, make the rules even more complicated?
No, I find the women's rugby is very exciting. There's slightly less grunt and more running. But they're incredibly skillful and very good at it, and it's a very exciting game to watch. So, I can see why they enjoy playing it, actually. And why shouldn't they? And the grunt people can do the grunt, and the speed aces can do the speed. It's an opportunity for everyone.
One of the things we talked about previously when we chatted before was actually how comfortable you are with the idea of failure because I think actually, to quote you in the podcast we previously did, "Ours is a lifetime of failure because you have to fail plentifully before you can actually get to a place where you're suddenly succeeding." Is that something that also you can think of in sporting terms? Because you mentioned a moment ago about why in psychology are you fine to win one day and not the other when you absolutely should. Is that something that fascinates you about sport?
Absolutely, yeah. And it fascinates me about everything cause if you're successful, what do you think about? You sit and glow in it, don't you? If you fail—
I don't know. I'm still waiting.
If you fail, boy, it sets your brain going. "Why did I fail? What could I have done better? What did they do that beat me?" So failure is much more interesting. Horrible cause, you know, you can't sleep and you're disappointed and spirits are down, but it's much more interesting than success cause I mean, Bath won last weekend, so what do they think about during the week?
I hope what they did wrong in their success, how could they have done better?
You're right, because it's so much easier to analyze a failure than it is to analyze a success.
Yeah. Well, and they're far more likely to analyze a failure than a success.
Yeah. But anyway, that's the job of the coaches. It's not my job.
No, but it is something that you find fascinating because it also totally relates to the world in which you're in, which is, like you said before, you know, you have to get very comfortable with failing.
