Tony Perich AM on Hard Work & Growing Wealth

Transcript

Introduction (0m 23s)

Brett Kelly:
Ladies and gentlemen, we have a very special guest with us for our next conversation. Tony Perich is the chief of all things at Perich Group, the joint managing director. He is now 84 years old, and I share that so that you can appreciate the long and amazing story that Tony's going to share with us. And without further ado, or me telling any of Tony's story, I just want to welcome Tony here today and ask you, where were you born and where did you grow up? And we'll move forward from there.

Tony Perich:
I was born in Australia, at actually Crown Street in Sydney, and my father used to push a push bike from Leppington to Crown Street in Sydney to come and visit me. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, Leppington is an area near Camden in Sydney. If you're not familiar, you should take the trip out there, and everywhere that your eye will see is land owned by the Perich family. How did your father come to be in Leppington, and what was his first land purchase, and what did he do on that land? 

Tony Perich:
Well, their first land, they actually only rented it. It was at Rossmore, and it used to grow tomatoes. And at that time, I was growing up and went to Rossmore Public School. Still there. A little one, little building, still there. And I couldn't speak a word of English. And so, that's my start of my life, not speaking word of English. Speak Croatian, I still speak it. And I actually started with... I learned the ABCs at school. 

The Beginnings of the Family Empire (0m 55s)

Brett Kelly:
Great. And so, your father's renting a market garden, a tomato garden. Running that. How does he then move to the first step in the empire? 

Tony Perich:
It's very hard. When you come to Australia with no money, nothing, so he rented and he made some money, and then he bought a little block of land, five acres. Then that wasn't big enough, so he went and moved, and he got to a place in Leppington, which was a big orchard there, and he started to grow tomatoes. But most people who grow tomatoes probably plant about 10,000. He would plant 70,000. So, he was one of the largest tomato growers there. But a lot of our tomatoes there during the war went to the army at Ingleburn. 

Brett Kelly:
Okay. So, was your dad, before he came to Australia, was he a farmer? Or did he just learn to farm? 

Tony Perich:
When you live in Croatia, it's only rocks there, so really, you can't farm much. There was olive trees and grapes and things. That type of things. They really learned everything when they come to Australia. 

Brett Kelly: 
Okay, so great migrant story. Comes here with nothing, learns how to become a farmer. We were just talking before, and I've always noted that you think long-term, 50 years, 100 years, and you think big. So, you've just mentioned your dad plants 70,000 tomatoes. Where does that big thinking come from? 

I think, father, because his aim was to own most of the land in Australia, he just worked. And I've got to say, my mother worked as hard as he did. They both worked together, and they actually taught us what value of work is, or what the value of where we should be going in the future. And I think we learned from a very young age that you have to work. 

And we went to school, and after I learned how to speak and all that type of thing, but when we come home, there was no go and play. Go out there and water tomatoes and carry tins. Or we'd get sometimes an ice cream if we cut the old tomatoes off the stakes, you see? There was no money, but we got little goodies. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, the year that your father bought that first farm, what year was that? 

Tony Perich: 
He was sponsored by a family in Young. So, he went out there in the cherry orchard, and he'd get one shilling to go and grab a sheep every day, and kill a sheep, and skin it and everything, so they could eat it. So, he did that. There's only one per... But he got a shilling for it, so he was very happy with that. So, that's where he started. Then he bought his first land, I suppose probably when I was... around just after I was born, about 1940.  

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. And then he's making cherries, growing cherries, selling them to the Army during the war. 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah. 

Brett Kelly: 
Now, he has this goal to own all the land in Australia, and he's done a good job of that. He starts to- 

Tony Perich: 
That was always a saying of his, and you could ask him. He's probably looking down there. You could ask him, "What do you want to do that for, Pop?" We call him Pop. He said, "You know what, son? They're not making any more land." 

Brett Kelly: 
So, now he's growing his tomatoes, he's growing this operation, when does he make the move into farming cattle? 

Tony Perich: 
Right, okay. So, we were supposed to go into school because we didn't like this farming bit. This was no good. And our biggest trouble is, when I was going to school, I was not good in English. So, you couldn't 

matriculate to university unless you passed in English. Well, I couldn't pass, because I never spoke it. I mean, my mother never spoke it. She was always spoke Croatian at home. So, we kind of went that way, you know what I mean? 

Brett Kelly: 
Yep, yep. So, you start farming post-school. 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah. So, when the school finished, I actually quit school. It was that bad. I didn't like it one bit. I said, "There's got to be better life than school because they're trying to teach me geography and history," and I wasn't interested in any of that. I want to know... I loved the woodworking and the metalworking, something with my hands, you know what I mean? I was good at it. 

So, I went home, and my father said, "What are you doing home?" He said, "Quit school, Pop." "Uh-huh. You know what you got to do now?" "What, Pop?" "Roll your sleeves up and get to bloody work." And that's a true story. 

And then my brother, we start thinking, "This is not good." And he was going to leave school, too, and he was two years younger than me, and he said, "What about we go into dairy farming, Pop?" So, he didn't have a clue about dairy farming. Not a clue. 

But we had a good friend of ours, Cooper, and he said, "Colombo, I'll teach you how to go to buy some cattle." So, we went to Camden's sale yards. And when you go into starting something new with a new person into a business, it's very tough because the people don't like you. And so, they were pushing the price up to my father, and Colombo said, "Don't worry about it, Colombo. Just buy it because that's a good cow." 

So, he did. And eventually they come up to me. "So, you're buying all the cows. You got to let us have a go." Then it happened that he started pushing that price up, so they paid more. So, it's stupid game in business. There's room for everyone in business if you want to work. Simple as that. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. So, he buys his cows?  

Tony Perich: 
It started with 14 cows milking. 

Financial Challenges and Success (6m 57s)

Brett Kelly: 
Okay, so this is amazing, guys. So, there was 14 cows. Today, how many cows do you have? 

Tony Perich: 
We're total, whole, the number's around 50,000. But we're just removing one dairy. By the time that Christmas comes, we'll be milking 17,000 cows three times a day, including Christmas Day. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, guys, that is a lot of milk. So, if you start with 14 cows, and over 60-odd years, you can get to 50,000 cows, 17,000 milk three times a day. Can't even think what the liters are. That's unbelievable. So, this business, as you start doing the cows, I remember being out on the property with you and I hope you'll tell us, as the herd of cows grows, is this where your dad's dream of buying the property next door comes from? 

Tony Perich: 
Well one, a good part of the success of our family is three people: my father, my brother, and myself. That's success of business. And no matter what you do, you must stay together, through the thick and thin, and don't either bend any other way. 

And my father was always the boss, but he never interfered with the direction we were going. If he saw we were doing something wrong, we'd come up and say, "Don't do that." So, I mean, the success was three people, and that's really what's happened. 

My brother was more into cow, and his aim was to produce the best cow in the country, and he did that. And not only did that, we partners with the Moxie family out west. They were a very great family friends of ours. But the problem in business, you've got to have money. And if you haven't got money, it's pretty tough. 

So, if you want to expand, it costs money. And these people run out of money. Bank wouldn't give it to them anymore, and they were in trouble. So, we've come in there, and we did it right. 

If I can go back, how did we get our first block of land? So, we went to the bank, actually. He come there anyway. Father wanted to get another block of land. Went to the bank, no trouble. Went back and again. And the bank said, "Haven't you got enough?" And he said, "No, well, I want more." I was with him then. 

So, it was one of them things when he didn't quite understand what the bank was saying. I said, "Pop, they're not going to give you any more money." "Why not?" "Because they said you've got enough." "But I haven't got enough." 

So I said, "What are we going to do?" He said, "I'm going to go across the road to the other bank," a commercial bank. So, we went across the road, and they got the money. So, "What are you going to do now, Pop?" He said, "I'm going back to the other bank and tell them off." You think it's funny, he did. 

Came back, and he sat there. I had all my paperwork. I'm only a school kid. I mean, I'm listening to all this, and I can't believe it. And they wouldn't give it to him. Sat there all day, and at 4:00 he got all of it and went back, and they give it to the commercial bank, and it was a great success story. 

The success story goes a lot further than that. We've kind of jumping up very fast. We should go back a bit. 

And then we start buying more land. And truly it's a story, as my father would say, "Because we're growing and farming, we had to have more land," so we had to keep buying land. 

And there was a place in Maitland, owned by one of the politicians. Was it Maitland, or someone? Forget who it was. Anyway, and so we bought this dairy up in Maitland, but it was really bad. It was run bad and everything, so we had to transfer it to Sydney. So, we had to buy another block of land to put this on. 

And we went there. In the meantime, Commonwealth Bank suddenly realised that they lost all their customers because this bloke wouldn't give them any money. So, Ron Henshaw was put in there. Some of the people might know Ron Henshaw. But anyway, he was really a good person of character. So, we'd go on the character. The bloke would do the right thing. And so, he lent a lot of people money, and lent us $1 million to buy one block of land. $1 million. 

Brett Kelly: 
What year would you think that was? 

Tony Perich: 
That was 40 years ago. Biggest loan ever in Liverpool branch. And so, that started us off, really did. So, we just kept adding land and land and land, and then we bought land at Bathurst. Then that wasn't big enough, then we bought the land at West Wyalong. That now is sitting at nearly 50,000 acres. And so, when we buy land, it's got to be good land. And we could go out in the Northern Territory and buy millions of acres, but I can produce more on a 1,000 acres here than a million acres out there. 

So, we look for good land, no matter where it is. And I tell you the truth, we've never looked for land for development, because we're not developers. We've never, ever thought about development. We just needed land for our farming. And we've got land right now. We've got land in Victoria, we've got land everywhere. Really, everywhere. 

Tony's Business Approach (8m 55s)

Brett Kelly: 
So, the movement from a huge then farming operation, to what you are well known for now in terms of property development, when did that happen? Because this is, as I understand, it's 40 years after the foundation of the farming empire. 

Tony Perich: 
Well, as we acquired all this land, it started from Bringelly. There's 1,500 I call them acres, sorry. May be hectares, but I'm an old fella, so I'm still in acres. So, 1,500 acres at Bringelly. So, we moved from Leppington to Bringelly, so we sold that, and so that helped pay for that. And then we started buying the land, everything from kind of Bringelly to Camden.  

We just bought one property after a property. There was one place in the middle we couldn't buy. Wouldn't sell it to us. So anyway, they put it on auction. I was there, but he didn't want me to buy it. So, I've dropped the bid, but a mate of mine had bought it for me. And then, I went up and signed the deal. It's all stupid, but the things you've got to do sometimes in life. 

And that's what we did. So, we accumulated all this property. And the second last property was Oran Park. That's the racetrack. Okay? Now, what the heck are we going to do with the racetrack? I have no idea of racetracks, so that was an easy way to build it. 

Brett Kelly: 
To, was it true your mum had said that you could buy Oran Park, but you couldn't race a car? 

Tony Perich: 
No, no, no. Coming to that. Coming to that. 

So, we bought the racetrack, and the only reason we bought it because there was two dairies on it. And we bought a lot of properties around the world. I'll go for this because it's a very interesting story. 

The government is stupid. They don't allow you to do things. I mean, there's a funny story, but no matter. The most important in business, you've got to have good accountants and good lawyers. That's the most important. Forget about everyone else. That's what runs your business. 

Anyway, we were buying these properties and taking the quota off them. No problems. We did buy the quota, and they stopped it. You couldn't buy the quota unless you bought the property, but we don't want the property. So, I remember going to John Marsden and telling him, "John, this bloody stupid government's telling me I've got to buy the property." I said, "You've got to find a way how I can't." And he said, "That's impossible." 

I went cranky and I said... I walked out of his office. And before I got home, he beat me home. "I found a way." This is how you find out how stupid it is. He says, "You've got to buy the property, then you sell it back to the bloke." 

"But isn't that double stamp duty?" "That's your answer." So, we did. We used to pay double stamp duty just to buy quota, because quota is a very important part of life. 

Brett Kelly: 
The quotas were for how many cows you could have, or- 

Tony Perich: 
We were milking. Then we got to about 2,000. We were working to three. 

Brett Kelly: 
And you had to buy the quotas. 

Tony Perich: 
Had to buy the quotas. Yeah. You could have a milk cow, but you couldn't sell the milk unless you had the quota. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yep, you had the quota. 

Tony Perich: 
So, we had to keep buying other quotas, because we were expanding. And it's a funny story. The government's always thinking that you're doing something wrong, and you're not. You just want to expand. And you don't allow us to expand. 

But there's always a loophole, and you can. That's why we work on accountants, and we've talked about some of those others, and lawyers, to find us a way to do it. 

And there is ways. And everything's to do with business. Now, be a land development. And we might talk about that later. But there's some funny stories there. 

So, really, the development then started when we owned, and then Mick Rainer comes in with a bloody helicopter, and John Marsden knew about it. He told me. He said, "What's this?" "Oh, they want to announce this new town." Okay. So, he lands a helicopter, come over there. And he announced this place is going to be the new South West Sydney Growth Corridor. 

Some Aerotropolis, or something like that it was. It was a way out thing. I laughed. I says, "Never going to happen." And not that I wanted it to happen, mind you. So, that sort of started the development. 

I should go back, because I jumped a bit on your question on when we bought the property. So, two dairies on it, and we're going to bulldoze the track because we don't want it. 

And it was a big crowd come there, "Can't do that." I know nothing about development, and so, "We'll help you." I thought, "This is going to be good." So, I went back to see me mum and father, and said, "They want to run the racetrack." And my mother said, "No way in the world. You're not getting on that racetrack." I said, "Well, why not?" She said, "No, you're not allowed to." I said, "What about if we don't ever go on it, can we keep it open?" "Yeah, but you've got to promise me you don't. 

And my mother passed away, and we still honor that promise. Never ever raced on the racetrack, and we owned it for 26 years. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah, that's a great story. Now, your mum is working as hard as your dad during this whole time. And these big goals, so own all the land in Australia. Then, your brother, build the best cow. Make the best cow in Australia. Does that come from your mum? 

Tony Perich: 
Well, my mother didn't like the dairy part, because it'd mean that we'd have to start work every morning at 4:00 in the morning. And she thought, "We shouldn't have to work that hard." But that's life. You did that. So, you'd start at 4:00 in the morning. And you'd finish at 8:00 at night. And it was no big deal. That's just something we did. And it was Christmas day, we worked Christmas day. So, it's nothing. 

But I want to tell you, though, I should tell you a story on how my mother's so powerful. When we're buying the Oran Park property, it went to tender. And my father would never tender. That's not, "I can't do that." So, I said, "Well, I'll give them a price." I went to the thing, and I said, "That's the price we'll pay for it." And, "No, no don't want that." Okay. 

Anyway, eventually come back, and he said, "Oh, you're still interested?" And I said, "Yeah, but we've got to go a bit more." So I went a bit more, and I couldn't make a deal. So, I come back, and saw my mother and told her, "Can't make a deal." She said, "I told you to buy the property." 

Brett Kelly: 
So, there's determination. 

Tony Perich: 
She's the one that said, "Just buy it." So, this is Sunday. We went back Sunday morning, had a coffee with him, and we made a deal. But the deal had to go a little bit more, and it had to be settled on by 12:00 Monday. 

 Tony's Tips for Building Business Success (16m 30s)

Brett Kelly: 
Right, okay. So, at that, how do you settle on that property on that timeframe? 

Tony Perich: 
I didn't think it was possible. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, you've signed the contract, you've agreed? 

Tony Perich: 
No, no, I don't do nothing without the Marsdens, or without you people. So, it's true, I don't. They've got to know everything what we do. And I rang Marsden. He said, "I'll organise it." I said, "Oh, okay." His lawyer was John Fay. 

So, they knew each other. We ended all coming there. And I went in there, and my father went there. We signed the papers and all that, and it's all done. And Ron Henshaw had a bank check ready. Just give him the bank check, and that was it. All they were done with. We couldn't believe it. 

Brett Kelly: 
But the quality of those relationships is we have had similar with our bank, great relationships, good behavior, and then they're there when you need them. And it's a pretty amazing story. Now, Oran Park, that land parcel, once you put it together, how large was that? 

Tony Perich: 
That was 1,600 acres in that one parcel. It was a very big parcel. And I think we paid, oh, we paid a lot of money. Three and a half million for it. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, what year was that? What year was that? Is it '98? 

Tony Perich: 
Pre-'85. We had to buy a lot of properties before this date. 

Long Term Vision and Patience (28m 30s)

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah, yeah, before that date. So, you get hold of that. And today, for people that are unfamiliar with the story, the Oran Park town development will hold more than 20,000 dwellings when it's finished, and should hold more residents than Canberra. So, to give you some sense of the scale. 

3,200 acres, it's gigantic. There is literally a master plan, and it is epic. 

But at the time, when you got hold of that land, and then put that parcel together, did you have in mind what subsequently became the master plan, or was it really just get the two dairies? 

Tony Perich: 
It weren't talked about. Probably jumping a fair bit now. It doesn't matter. When it come to actually this to happen, I'm not a developer, didn't have a bloody clue. 

I'd done some development, so we did one development in Canberra, with a joint venture with the government down there. And I did some five acre developments around other farms we've owned, because we bought farms and sold them, so we always tried to get the best. So, we did that. 

But to do a master plan development, that was impossible. So, what I did, I ended up with 22 people, put them on a plane and went to America and studied what's going over there. And we picked one place, Las Colinas, which is just outside of Dallas, Texas, and Oran Park is based around that. 

It was owned by a farmer. Same thing. He owned 50,000 acres there, and he started this development. It was magic. It went bankrupt. So, I learned something there not to overdo it and go bankrupt. So, you have to learn from other people. You really do. 

And so we went there more than once. And the last time we went there, we had the mayor there. What do you call it, the governor, and all that type of thing. Everyone was there. And I actually said, and they fed us, "What are you doing this for?" He said, "We're only doing what other people did to us. We're paying back." And I thought that was very impressive. 

I do the same now. I have a lot of people come there, I feed them, and do whatnot with a group, and give back how I learned from overseas. But I learned from overseas how to develop Oran Park, the master plan. That was a big thing. 

Master planning is about having all the services around. One of the biggest thing, the best thing, is have the Council there. How do you move Camden Council out of where it is? It was an old place. So, you do it very easy. You give them the land. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yep. So, that's a great story, guys. Tony wanted to get Camden Council into the middle of the development. It is the middle of Camden, the development site. Share the story. You went to give them the land. They couldn't take it for nothing. 

Tony Perich: 
So, we said, "We'll give you the land." "We take nothing for nothing. That's bribery." So, they give me $1. That's not bribery. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, now when you go there, you'll see the council is, it's a great building. It has really formed part of the town. 

Tony Perich: 
Oh, it is. No, they really made it, they did it right. The thing is that today everything's wrong. I just tell you, the government's stupid. I mean, there's a lot of good amongst it, but they do some silly things. I mean, how do you get to where we are without being crooked? 

Well, we grow probably corn, thousands and thousands of acres of corn, and we have helicopters flying over our crops, because they reckon we're growing stuff in the middle of the corn paddocks. And we see them. Know who they are. Unbelievable. Never even think about that. You know what I mean? But they check us out all the time. They check us out on everything. We are just number one, the government. We've fought them for too long. We might come up with that later. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, as you go through, we're talking about it's very hard to put fight into people, but you and your brother and your dad and your mum, you're prepared to stand up and fight for the vision of what you were trying to build. You often get the tax office or government, or whoever. What's the philosophy? Just keep moving? 

Tony Perich: 
When we first started to get attacked by the Taxation Department, and all the other, everyone else should think about it. We actually were, we didn't know. We thought we're kind of, bloody hell, we're doing something wrong. 

So, then, because we went to the accountants and the lawyers and said, "Well, we keep getting attacked." He said, "Yep, because they reckon you shouldn't be making that much money." And we weren't making that much money. We're in debt to the bank up here, not here. 

But we paid all our way, and whatnot, and we still borrow from the bank. You know what I mean? But if it wasn't for our accountants and the lawyers, we would kind of been in trouble. 

But we took them on in court on one of the first big cases, at the airport, they wanted to take a hundred acres of land, and wanted to give us nothing. So, we ended up suing them for 40 million, and their figure was four.  

And after several years, because they think you're going to run out of money. They really do think you're going to run out of money. But you don't. Just, you've got to keep going. Don't give up. I'm telling you, don't give up. 

You've got to be right. I mean, if you haven't got good accountants and good lawyers to steer you in the right direction, you haven't got a hope. No, truly, because I'm not any good at it. 

But you've got to believe in people like yourself. And we do, and we win. And we go for several other cases. We've just gone for another one. You've got to believe in what you're doing. But it's not us. The accountants, they come and say, "Well, we can win this case, this and that." Then you've got to have a good lawyer. Then you've got to have a good barrister, and all that. 

But in the airport case, we ended up settling by 25 million. And I didn't want to settle. But after seven years, you actually get tired. So, we just settled out of court. It's crazy stuff. Why would they fight it? They know they're not going to win, but they do it because of some... It'd still be happening now. 

We've still got blokes. This little young bloke that comes in there out of university and says, "I can win this case", and do that just to make a name for himself. And he's never going to do it. Is that right or wrong? 

Brett Kelly: 
Yep, absolutely. They're just trying to make a name for themselves. Envy is a bit of a national sport in Australia. And so you do see a lot of bad behavior, particularly from government instrumentality. Seven years of people's lives is horrendous. It's real time, and it's horrible. 

But I've always admired that clients like yourself stand up and are prepared to fight. And I genuinely don't believe you can build anything without having the willingness to fight when people don't do the right thing. 

Tony Perich: 
No, no. You really have to. I mean, even in business, you can't let, either, the competitor push you around. Just do what you believe is right. It doesn't matter if the other competitor thinks we shouldn't be doing it that way. I believe the way I'm doing things is right. 

Now, I'm very lucky in a sense. I actually have a real good team behind me too. And that helps. So, I can't do it on my own. My brother, he's more on the farming, but on development, I have a lot of people around me, and they do a brilliant job. They have the same quality of ideas I have. And they can see the master plan is the way we should be going. 

Now, we do bend it a little bit as we go, but basically our team works together. And I said earlier, the only success of us is the people working together. Not everyone can.  

But the main thing is my brother and myself work together. 

Brett Kelly: 
Work together. Now, how have you kept that together, as a family? 

Tony Perich: 
We thought it might be a problem when my father passed away. I've never argued with my brother, but he argues with me. 

Brett Kelly: 
Perfect. That works. The sound of one hand clapping. 

Tony Perich: 
I promised my father, when he died, that I would never argue with my brother. And if he goes crook, "Come here", I just cop it. 

Brett Kelly: 
Which takes respect. 

Tony Perich: 
That's what you've got to do. And don't think... You know, you're the eldest, take responsibility and just accept what's there. You know what I mean? 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. 

Tony Perich: 
Sometimes I could have management. I've had CEOs there, and they're just not for me. It just didn't work. You know what I mean? And now I have Tim, he knows exactly what I want, and he's like me. He thinks like me, and it's marvelous. You know what I mean? 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. 

Tony Perich: 
It's important. You've got to have, it's a different type of person, really. Not everyone can be hard. I mean, if Tim sees something wrong, I mean he would say, "Come on, we've got to fight for this." And that type of thing. And that's what I've got to have, because you've got to be strong. But it can't be strong, and I'll repeat it a hundred times, without a good lawyer and a good accounts, because they've got to do all the figures. They've got to do all the work, otherwise it doesn't happen. 

Succession Planning and Mentoring the Next Generation (34m 14s)

Brett Kelly: 
Totally. So, when you look at the business now, we were talking before, and I asked you six and a half thousand sites. It's going to go to 20. And you said, "Look, this could take 20 to 50 years." How do you think so long term, because most people don't? 

Tony Perich: 
Well, probably because I've got two sons. They're really keen on what they're doing. They work hard. On my brother's side, he's got some young boys coming up there. They're really keen on farming. So, that's the type of thing. I think, "Well, there's a lot of young people could take over with the go." 

I have one grandson who's a really good bloke, and everything, he's family, but he doesn't want to work. Doesn't like work. Well, it's no good coming to work with me. So, he doesn't. It's a shame. So, that hurts. 

Brett Kelly: 
He'd probably enjoy it. 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah, that hurts. That hurts. So, everything you do in life is not good. And that's one that's not good. And I've got some of the girls coming into the business. That's good. But I'm very tough, and they don't get nothing for nothing. No, nothing for nothing. I never got nothing for nothing, so why should they get nothing? Work for it, then you get rewarded. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah, makes sense. Now, as you've shared that, the hardest times with banks, because in development, borrowing money, what have been the hardest situations you've faced, and how did you just keep going? 

Tony Perich: 
You know what, I'm very lucky. I don't have to do a lot in that there, because I've got Tim and other people, they're doing that for me. But I hate the banks. And because, look, I'll show you, we've got a big shopping center at Narellan. And we had started off at this bank, at that bank, then went to Suncorp. They were a real good bank. Then they called the money in. But hang on, fellas. 

... but anyone, fellas, where am I going to get that from? And well, we know you'll be able to find it because that Suncorp got into trouble then a while back, you know what I mean? And so lucky, Commonwealth bank come in and bankroll, otherwise we could have been in trouble too. So, that's how people get in trouble. Therefore, you've got to try and... Now we work about around a few banks because if one would give us a hard time, we go to the other one. But you've got to... Look, you can't grow without banks. Now, you really can't. 

I mean, if you're getting hard now in a bit of business and when you borrow money at 6%, you only get an 8% return, I suppose it's better than nothing. But you look for capital gains. So, they mightn't be making money are there, but there's capital gains going up, so it's great. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, the philosophy on gains in your land holdings, you mentioned to me before, you know that the land is going to appreciate so you're a happy owner. 

Tony Perich: 
Yes. 

Brett Kelly: 
If government doesn't move quick enough? 

Tony Perich: 
We don't care. Know what the story is? We are farming there, so we need the land. As we sell land, we buy more land. Now we bought land locally and paid a lot of money for local land because it had irrigation on it. Really, we are true farmers. Just because the land development, why would I want to sell something and let someone else make profit out? I might as well do it myself. I employ a lot of people to do that, to help me. And like I said, without a team, you can't do it anyway. But we accumulated 5,000 acres in that area. Now, what the heck, you're going to develop all that? It's going to take 50 years, a minimum. 

Now, we're planning, and I actually don't do that. There's other people in the office to do that. I mean, when a plan comes out, I disagree with it and then they change it. Then they come back and say, "Well, that's more like it," that type of thing. But I don't actually do the work. You know what I mean? 

Brett Kelly: 
But from a very young age, your dad saw that you had this desire to grow something. Where do you think that came from? 

Tony Perich: 
Probably because I was no good at school, so I had to find other ways of doing things. And my father saw, I was keen. I mean, he used to get crook on me because I wanted to buy a tractor. We had three tractors and then I'd buy another one and we got up to 10, he said, "What do you want all these tractors for?" But we've got to keep going, got to go. We now have about 400 tractors. And so I don't know, I actually don't know what drove me. You know what I mean? I was probably, when I got married, I was very fortunate. I had a beautiful wife who worked alongside of me, milking and cows. 

And it's a funny story. It's a good story to tell. When we got married she said, "I'll marry your brother too." Because he lived with us straight up. I said, it wasn't that exciting. But anyway, one of them things and my wife accepted that. I kind of didn't, but my mother kicked him out. She told him, "You go and live with your brother." So, we accepted that, it was no big deal, but Cathy cooked for him and she worked alongside him and I said, "Well, we've got two choices. You want to drive a Holden or a Mercedes?" 

True story. She don't want to drive a Mercedes. You know what that means? She said, "Yep, I'm happy with that." And that's how it started. She worked alongside me driving tractors, trucks. She really worked hard. And that's the same again, working together. My brother's wife, she was milking cows too when they got married. So, our wives worked alongside of us.  

Brett Kelly: 
So, it's always been a family business. Everyone's been in there working very, very hard together. 

Tony Perich: 
Yes. So, I mean it's working together. I think that's made us... Always got to be one boss, father was that one boss always. I've tried to be that one boss and sometimes I'll get abused and whatnot, but I'll cop it and just keep going. That's all you could do, you know? 

Brett Kelly: 
So, with your kids coming through on both sides of the family, what do you hope that... How do you think about mentoring your kids and bringing your kids through? 

Tony Perich: 
That's a tough one. That's a tough one. Nobody wants to work like me. Nobody. There's got to be somebody. There's got to be somebody. So, that's a whole problem with right, company set up that can't be broken up, thanks to these people. It's set up, it can't be broken up so they can do whatever they like. They can only get dividends. So, the businesses keep going all the time. They can't break it up unless it's 100% agreeable, and that'll never happen. So, the business will keep growing. That's been set up for a long time. And again, the same thing, the accountants do all that and I haven't got a clue how it's done. But anyway, somehow they do it and I accept that. 

Brett Kelly: 
They know they're in there, right? 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah. But I'm still supposed to be the number one and someone has to try to be, but sometimes it's difficult. It really is. Especially for the younger generation. My boys, sometimes they'll tell me off. I said, "Okay, good on you." Just cop it and just, what else are we going to do? 

Brett Kelly: 
So, it is the hardest thing in life is raising kids, in my view. Often people say to me, "How do you do this?" I think anything I have to do is easy. Trying to mentor your kids or do anything with them is much more challenging. But all I've been able to come up with is a good example.  

Tony Perich: 
I think, one, you've got to get the kids interested in. Well, they don't really... One doesn't like farming. He does it, but he's into more development and they're both pilots. They love airplanes and we need airplanes. We just bought another company that has an airplane, so we've got two airplanes now. You know what I mean? We fly around everywhere and I suppose you have to buy companies that the boys are interested in. I think that's what it is. We bought one company just recently and I didn't buy it out, just bought a part of it. Fairly big part. Multiquip, looks after all the chicken industries all around Australia and my son loves that because they've got a jet and he flies them around, but it does work at the same time. 

So, I think he's very interested in that. And then a deal come up recently, which I'm not happy with, but doesn't matter. But it wasn't an idea of mine. It was Tim and Darren's idea, but they convinced the boys and they said, "This is going to go, we're going to buy ports." What the heck are we going to do that for? It's kind of diversification. So, now we've got a big stack and port in Onslow and Broome. 

We're building a new port in Broome, which is a floating port, which is going to take over the old one. So we're building a part of that. So, we put a lot of money into that stuff. But the younger generation loves that type of thing. I suppose sometimes my father did these things I liked. So, I suppose I'm trying to do the same. 

I don't like it. I could have out voted it, but I thought no, we'll let it go. And I think that's sometimes you've got to do that to keep the family going and keep working together. I mean, give them one thing. You know what I mean? So, I think that's important. I think that's a good story. 

Brett Kelly: 
And you guys have worked very harmoniously for a very long time and it is increasingly unusual, so it's really great for people to hear. What do you see as your 30-year goal, your 20-year goal? 

Tony Perich: 
Well, very difficult on that because you might be talking about development. Development is a great thing, but development is not very rewarding. Is financially, but personally is not rewarding, because building a leisure center, we're building a new town. That is, but the rest, I mean, we'll have one and a half million on the roof of square meters of industrial land. Is that exciting? Does nothing for me, I'm telling you. Yet, if I go and buy a more cows and we've got one girl who's really good on quality and cattle, she buys some of the best cattle you can. But now we breed our own. But she does a great job. You know what I mean? And so you get rewarded when you look at the cow, when I go up there on the farms and look at her cow, it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. You want to cuddle and kiss her. 

I mean, I'll give you a story. 

And Gerry Harvey, Gerry Harvey, I know him well. He had that property in Shepparton and his partner really got stuck into it, bad. Anyway, decided to sell it, we bought it. Won't go to price or anything like that. And since we bought it, we tripled it and they couldn't even do what they were doing. We tripled the amount of cattle on that property now, that's because we are good at it, you know what I mean? Now I've got other people around, not just me. You've got to have some good people. In the farming area, especially the Moxie family, have some good people amongst them coming through and everything. And Michael Perridge's sons are going through, very keen on agriculture. So there's some good people coming around there. So, I see a good future out there for us to probably milk at least 20,000 a day. That's our aim. 

Brett Kelly: 
Just off that one property? 

Tony Perich: 
No, not the one. That's off three farms. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. Okay. So, the long-term vision for the group is for the family to come through and continue to build out this diversified group. 

Tony Perich: 
Diversified. Right now, we aim to grow the chicken industry better because we look after all the chicken industry around the farm. We feed them. And we're doing now about 42,000 ton of feed every week to feed the chickens. That's a lot of trucks. 

I've got to show you the green book. Without the green book, nothing happens. 

See live birds is 23 million kilograms. That's live birds, what we kill. And then we got 3 million eggs we hatch every week. So, we have a big hatchery that supplies out there, so that's going to grow bigger. We’ve grown very big, building a new hatchery at Tamworth, killed 3 million birds a week. That's enormous. You know what I mean? 

So, that industry's grown very big with Ingham's and Baiada, there's a lot other ones too. A lot of, but they're the big ones. And so we look after all their birds. The team, they've gotten very good, but they've got the same trouble. They've got into financial difficulties with the bank, growing too fast and then needed partner, so we come in there and help them and we know what we're doing. So, that makes a difference. 

Brett Kelly: 
So, your passion is really farming. You've had lots of other opportunities as a result of that. When you look back, you've had very long-dated relationships. What are the things that have given you the most joy in what you've done? 

Tony Perich: 
Well, definitely not land development. So, probably farming. I mean, right now, we are planting probably about 38,000 acres of grain. And when you see that crop growing off and then you see we've got all the headers working there, my granddaughters drive the headers. And when you see that there, that's really something. It really is something. I mean, I get excited at harvest time, I suppose that's my farming. I can watch the rotary, what we're doing, new rotary building, there's 120 cows in one rotary. I can't wait until that's built. It's just getting built now. 

And to see the cows now, I think it'll be incredible. You know what I mean? I love trucks. I love trucks, and they've got about 500 of them now. And I'm a machine man. And you see some of the big tractors we've got here. Well, we can't fit in this room, that's for sure. 

They're monsters, you know what I mean? So, that's all fun. You're getting a lot of fun, a lot of pressure of watching things grow. And I think corn, when we grew corn harvest and we have these big machines with up to 12-foot head front going through the corn, it's brilliant. It's just brilliant. If you see some of the silage, we put 200,000 ton of corn down and so we've got enough storage in our farms to handle a drought for two years without anything... Never happened because we had water, you know what I mean? But we have enormous reserves for the cows. 

And remember the old story is, the cow is most important, but it's got to be comfortable. A cow comfort. You can't have a cow going down the paddock where they're mud up the knees and expect to milk it. And our sheds, we keep them all inside. With our sheds, they've got their own bed, they have a bed, it's on sand and if it gets hot, the fans turn up and the water sprayers come in to keep them cool. So, it's just all about cow comfort. I get excited about all that. Now, how can you get excited about land development when you put in a rezoning and six years later you're still fighting it? Would that be exciting? 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah, it's ridiculous. No. 

Tony Perich: 
There's got to be something better in life than land development, I'm telling you. 

Brett Kelly: 
That's so funny. So, happy cow, happy life. 

Tony Perich: 
That's right. Happy wife, happy man. 

 The Importance of Giving Back (52m 48s)

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah, absolutely. So much fun. So look, we could talk all day. Tony's a wonderful person. I think everyone can learn so much from him and his journey. And I'll say it in front of Tony, he's contributed enormously in every community that he's been a part of. He's recognised for his community contribution everywhere him and his family have played. And I think it's a tremendous example of how to live well and how to do business well. 

Tony Perich: 
If I say one thing. I don't know if I said it, but one of the most important things in the business and in life. If you do well, please give back. Now you can give back in many ways. You can personally give something there. I give personally back. The family gives personally things back. We do. I've got three sapphires in Paul Harris Fellows, it's very hard to get that. I've got an AM. 

So, I do a lot of work, but you've got to believe in what you're doing. What our family tries to do, we'd never give back to individuals. We give back to say research. Right now with Ingham Institute at Liverpool, which is a very big thing that they've just created, our center of robotics. I'm a great believer in robotics. And robotic surgery is what's going to happen today, and I can tell you that a doctor can be sitting in this room operating on a doctor in Japan. It's hard to believe, but that's what you can do with the robotics today. So we put a lot of money into that and we've got a robotic center at the Ingham Institute, which we funded there completely, we're running and everything. And so it's a way of giving back. But by doing that, everyone benefits, not just you or me, but a lot of people could benefit around the world. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah, that's amazing. 

Tony Perich: 
I think that's important. Don't just give it to individuals. I mean, there's a lot of people that needs money out there, but we do a ropery function aboard on Saturday night. It's actually Saturday night. My job is to raise the money. I did have a help bit on Tim and a few others, but I've got 1 million and 50,000 raised. 

Brett Kelly: 
At Liverpool. So the Catholic Club in Liverpool, a room this size, they'll raise over a million dollars. Tony's an excellent fundraiser. He'll typically phone you and tell you how much you're donating, which works excellent, which is tremendous. That's the right way to raise money. And every year at least 50 community organizations come on the stage, get a meaningful check. And that community supporting its community where Tony and his friends have really led the charge, is one of the best things you're ever going to see. There's a lot of people trying to raise money. There's no waste in terms of the event. You pay for your ticket. There's no cost of the event and all that money goes out to the community. 

Tony Perich: 
And Kelly+Partners is the one responsible for the foray. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yep. We get the call, and we send money, but it's one of those great joys. We get a lot of calls. And I have to say, we get a lot of calls from people looking for us to support different things. But it has always been something I've loved supporting because I knew a hundred percent of that check, because the people calling us, they're not looking for the money, they're not looking for any glory. They just get the money to the causes that really make a difference. It's a really great event. 

Brett Kelly: 
So Tony, if you were starting today again in 2024, what would you do differently? 

Tony Perich: 
I wouldn't do nothing differently, truly, but it would be impossible to do again what I did, what we've done. Impossible. You don't have the opportunity today for a young person to do what we did. Not possible. That's a shame. But you just can't do it. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. So if your 18-year-old grandchild comes to you and says, "Hey grandpa, what do I do?" Explain to people. Tony said he works hard. Just explain the work hard ethic, just how hard you've worked as a young guy? 

Tony Perich: 
Well, let's put it this way. When Harvest is on, we were feed loading and we'd milk a lot of cows in Sydney. I was driving trucks with a few other people. I'd leave home at five o'clock, get the load, and end up home about between 12 and 2 in the morning, I still drive an extra. My wife and my brother would get up and I load the truck, and then at five o'clock, I'd go out again. They'd fuel the truck for me, I'd go out again. That's what happened. To get carriers to do that was too expensive. We couldn't afford it. So we had to do everything ourselves. Now, sometimes today it's very difficult, you see, because no one wants to do that anymore. So no, none of my sons would do it. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. So that opportunity is still available, although seldom accessed. So there's increasing pressure on the farming sector to reduce waste, use less chemicals, decarbonise, improve soil. Is this an achievable challenge for your business or are people that have never been to a farm asking too much from farmers? 

Tony Perich: 
No, no. Definitely can be achieved. But we're doing that now. We don't plough the paddocks now, we direct drill. That's enormous savings in fuel, enormous saving on dust, not going up from the ground, so we're doing that. Chemical storage is very important. People store the chemicals. If a drum, we don't use DDT anymore. Certain chemicals don't use as other things. That's no good anymore. So we don't use hormones. We used to use them years ago. Now we don't do it anymore. It was hormones were just to put a thing in the ear. It was nothing but it comes out in the meat. So we don't do that. Yes, you've got to do that. I think it's important that that is done because if it's unhealthy, you shouldn't produce it. And you're learning, there's no such thing as hormones in chickens or anywhere anyway. 

Anyway, those days are gone, and they should be too. So we try to make sure that we do the best we can. Like I said, happy cow. We look after our cattle. Well, in milk, you've got to be careful what you even feed the cows, because it could come out in the milk. It's important that it can be cheap. Can it be? Our biggest problem is the fuel cost. And we use a lot of fuel because we pump a lot of water and we always irrigate and we would have 70 pivots now running with the water, so that kills us. And how they can achieve that, I don't believe they can. 

Brett Kelly: 
In the short term. 

Tony Perich: 
Otherwise farmers can do what they got to do. Some super farmers push trees out and push them into their creek. That's the worst. Because that causes erosion, you know what I mean? So you've got to do it properly. 

Balancing Debt (1h 03m 03s)

Brett Kelly: 
Totally. Now how do you look at debt now in 2024 compared to 40 years ago? 

Tony Perich: 
Well, the debt is never pay a bank back. I never have. Yep. 

Brett Kelly: 
So just roll out? 

Tony Perich: 
Just keep rolling it over. Sometimes you do when you sell some property on you, you do pay a debt, but you go and borrow again. 

But the idea, why would you want to pay debt back? I'd rather pay a bit more interest and just keep it growing because to get a new debt, it just costs more money. You know what I mean? 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. Establishment fees, it kills you. 

Tony Perich: 
The time and carry on. So I'd do the same. No, don't pay the bank back. 

Brett Kelly: 
That's great. Assuming all the farming income went to servicing debt for a very long time, at what point did the family start to actually feel or spend the wealth that was being created? When did you start to feel like you were doing well financially? 

Tony Perich: 
Land development. I wish I didn't have to say that. That was the only good thing about it. The rewards of land development is crazy. I mean, you bought the land, you pay a hundred dollars an acre for it now, and it is selling for bloody, you don't call it acres, we sell it now $1,700 for a square meter of land. $1,750 a square meter. Right now we've got to put roads and everything.  

It seems stupid, you know what I mean? But that's what the market is. And so I have a bit of a problem with that. But that's where the big money is. What we do, we still go and buy more land and things of that, but no matter how much money we have in our family, we won't change the way we do things It won't change the way they're living. We just lived the ordinary life. That's why I run a Mercedes car. Big deal. I've been doing that for the last 50 years. You know what I mean? But I still don't go anything. And then I just keep going. But you're right. When the land started getting developed, boy did the money come got me. 

Brett Kelly: 
So in the beginning of your family's journey, how did you balance your debt and continue to grow so aggressively, especially given you kept all the land. You were very good at farming and making money out of the farms. 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah, it's good. Well, you're very fortunate the banks love farmers because there's a good asset there and they know it's never going to go backwards. I told you before, they're not making anymore. All right? And Sydney's running out of land. 

That's a good asset no matter what it is. But west, we got one farm out the west there and the neighbor wanted to sell his properties, 20,000 acres. So I put a bid on, I thought we'd go to 25 million. We went to auction, got 50. I was way off the mark, but I didn't think I could make it work at that. So I didn't go. And a Superfund bought it, the Canadian Superfund, they're paying ridiculous money. And I don't know why they're making it hard for the farmers, you know what I mean? But I would've bought that farm, but we didn't. And so I think that's why the banks kept lending us money. We've never paid the loan back. 

Brett Kelly: 
And you're not paying crazy prices for the assets? 

Tony Perich: 
No, we don't pay the crazy price of assets. Sometimes we think we do, but in the end it's not. You know what I mean? 

But the best buy was all that land that's getting developed now. We paid nothing for it. You know what I mean? But in them days it wasn't a lot of money. 

Brett Kelly: 
Yeah. 

Brett Kelly: 
How much was Oran Park Raceway? Do you remember? Three and a half million? 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah. 

Brett Kelly: 
That was big money. 

Tony Perich: 
It was. 

Brett Kelly: 
At that time. Even today when we partnered with our firm in Campbelltown, people in the city were like, "What are you doing out there?" And that was years after you'd bought Oran Park. People just thought it was so far away and it never was. It wasn't then and it isn't now. But it's interesting the way the consensus can be. So farming can be tough, what is required to encourage Australian kids to take up the challenge of farming? 

Tony Perich: 
It's got to be in your blood, really. And that corporate can take over farming, unless you're personally involved. And me personally involved, and now my brother's son, he's personally involved with farming and he travels to the farms right now. He's looking after new me. We had that bit of a sometimes in life. I'm not ashamed to say it. You get dutted. It was Freedom Foods. It was pretty easy. My family got dutted only for 240 million. Wow. 

Brett Kelly: 
How did you cope with that? 

Tony Perich: 
I got the satisfaction that I actually found the problem. I knew there was a problem there. I told Tim, I said, there's a problem here. I can't figure it out. It's all another thing. But then I went around looking, so I found some part of the problem. So we are trying to rebuild that back. I think we will. So Michael had to move into that. Our son had to move into as a manager of that now called Loomi. And that does milk lab and Australia's own products. So it's coming back and I think it will get there, but it's still got to pick me up 240 million. And we had to put more money in. That was the trouble. 

Brett Kelly: 
So on that, when you lose money, what's your psychology around losing money in that way? 

Tony Perich: 
I'll tell you, the first time I lost money. I did a deal. I got dutted again, wonder why I did, but anyway, and I went home. How am I going to tell this to Ronnie and pop? So I went in there and I said, pop, we just dropped 3 million on this deal. And he said, "Well, you can't win them all, can you?" 

Brett Kelly: 
Was that your dad? 

Tony Perich: 
Yeah. I said, "Oh, okay. It's all right?" "Yeah, bad luck. Don't stop, keep going." So he was an encourager. It was a true story. So 3 million a long time ago was a lot of money. 

Brett Kelly: 
That's a lot of money. 

Tony Perich: 
So now this here, this was hard because I blame myself. I should have picked it up earlier. I was smart enough to know, and I picked up a lot of people in our company who'd done the wrong thing. But it's just one of them things. And that's one of my worst nightmares in my opinion. So everything's not good in business. 

Brett Kelly: 
No, no, not at all. So my observation has always been you're just very determined and persistent and your attitude is to keep going. 

Tony Perich: 
Yes. Just keep going. Don't worry about it. Just keep going. And father told me, "Hey, you made a mistake. Keep going. Now that it's done, don't let it stop you." And we haven't. 

Now, I could tell you about these ports. I'm against that, but I'll keep going. It's got to work. 

Brett Kelly: 
It's an unduplicable asset. It's amazing. So look ladies and gentlemen, I'd love you to put your hands together for Tony. 

Thank you. 

Tony Perich: 
Thank you, so much. 

--End of transcript--