Wealth & Money Quote by Philip Green

Green is trying to launder self-interest into virtue, pitching restraint as character. The line is built like a humblebrag: I could have been harsher, but I chose decency. It frames layoffs as an optional moral failing rather than a structural feature of modern retail finance. By stressing "it's not my style", he turns business decisions into personality traits, as if employment is protected by taste, not strategy.

The subtext is defensive. British Home Stores, long a high-street fixture, became a case study in what happens when legacy retailers are treated like assets to be optimized rather than institutions with obligations. Against that backdrop, "I want to make my money as a retailer" is a reputational hedge: it distances him from the caricature of the corporate raider who extracts value through closures, property plays, and balance-sheet engineering. "Not by putting people out of work" is crafted for the public gallery, a clean moral contrast that invites applause while sidestepping the messier question of responsibility when a business falters anyway.

What makes the quote work is how it narrows the field of blame. It suggests that job losses are primarily a choice of cruelty, not the result of debt, rent, competition, managerial decisions, or long-term underinvestment. The rhetoric offers workers as proof of benevolence, turning their livelihoods into a credential. It's retail capitalism asking to be judged by intention, not outcomes - and asking the audience to mistake brand-image ethics for accountability.