Chapter 3 – Our way of Doing Business
August 1992: Under the captaincy of Sean Fitzpatrick, the All Blacks travelled to South Africa to play the Springboks for the first official tour since 1976, and South Africa’s first international rugby test following the end of apartheid.
The company had just recently ventured into providing immigration services as International Investment & Immigration Limited. Seeing the opportunity to “piggy-back” on the All Blacks, the company advertised it’s immigration services in the South African newspapers. Richard recalls receiving 144 responses to this advertising – many received by phone in the middle of the night! These were the days of fax, phone and post – no email or internet in those days! After many sleepless nights, long faxes and the costs of sending information packages to South Africa, the business secured just one client.
As a consequence, Richard decided not to advertise again. Instead, he focussed on this one client, who then introduced another three clients and these clients introduced more clients - thus the business began to grow based purely on its client relationships and its performance. This approach of really getting to know clients and building longstanding, trusted and personal relationships has been the key to the success of the Pathways business and is something that continues through to today.
How the landscape has changed! Now with the push of a button your message can reach many thousands of people and you can communicate at no cost, 24 hours a day, with as many people as you may wish! But the importance, enjoyment and mutual rewards gained from our relationships with our clients has never changed.
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