food. We do it for the thrill of the hunt.
Recently, I’ve become a bit more mellow about retribution and paranoia. Although I still believe both are necessary, I now realize that vengeance can waste a lot of time better spent on new developments and deals, and even on building a better personal life. If you can easily dismiss a negative from your life, it’s better to do so. Seeing creeps as a form of corruption that you’re better off without is a great time-saving device.
Still, sometimes you’ve just got to screw them back.
For example, a while ago I agreed to invest a small amount in a new restaurant venture. I did this with the full expectation that I was throwing this money down the drain, because most of these clubs are not successful. I liked the two young guys who approached me to invest and figured I’d give them a break—plus a good friend of mine had asked me to help them.
When the restaurant opened, it was a smash hit. Crowds of people lined up to get in. Money was pouring in. It was incredible.
About a year later, I realized that I hadn’t received a single dollar from the owners—no repayment of my initial investment and certainly no profit. I called two of the guys who got me into the deal and said, Fellas, come on, I know success when I see it. You ought to pay back your investors.
One of them said, Oh, we’re working so hard, and the money just isn’t coming in fast enough.
My response: Bullshit! I don’t believe it. From my perspective, they seemed to be living like kings.
Eventually, I received my first equity distribution from them, for a fraction of my investment. I was furious and sent an angry letter to the managing partner, in which I asked for a public investigation of their records.
I’m an instinctive businessman and I hate being screwed. I can’t prove they did anything wrong without spending more money to investigate them than my investment is worth, but my hunch is that investors like me should have been repaid six times their initial investment by now.
Now whenever I see the guys I tried to help, they wave to me and I just turn my back. The sad thing for them is that had I felt that they treated me (and their other investors) fairly, I probably would have backed them for millions on their next deal.
Maybe I’ll sue them anyway, just to prove my point. Business can be tough, but you’ve got to stay true to your principles.
Sometimes You Have to Hold a Grudge
For years, I supported the governor of New York Mario Cuomo. I was one of his largest campaign contributors. I never asked for a thing while he was in office. For my generous support, he regularly thanked me and other major contributors with a tax on real estate so onerous that it drove many investors away from the city. It became known as the Cuomo Tax.
After he was defeated for reelection by a better man (and governor), George Pataki, I called Mario to ask for a perfectly legal and appropriate favor involving attention to a detail at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which at the time was being run by his son Andrew.
Mario told me that this would be hard for him to do, because he rarely calls the Secretary on business matters.
I said to him, Mario, he is not the Secretary. He’s your son.
Mario said, Well, I think of him as the Secretary, and I refer to him as that—he’s got a very serious job to do.
I understood Mario’s concern about impropriety, but I wasn’t asking him to do anything even slightly questionable—this was a simple, aboveboard request, the kind of favor that takes place between friends in the private and public sectors all the time. Finally, I asked Mario point-blank, Well, are you going to help me?
In a very nice way, he essentially told me no.
I did the only thing that felt right to me. I began screaming. You son of a bitch! For years I’ve helped you and never asked for a thing, and when I finally need something, and a totally proper thing at that, you aren’t there for me. You’re no good. You’re one of the most disloyal people I’ve known and as far as I’m concerned, you can go to hell.
My screaming was so loud that two or three people came in from adjoining offices and asked who I was screaming at. I told them it was Mario Cuomo, a total stiff, a lousy governor, and a disloyal former friend. Now whenever I see Mario at a dinner, I refuse to acknowledge him, talk to him, or even look at him.
I will say this, however. Mario’s wife, Matilda, is a fine woman and was a terrific friend to my mother. It’s not her fault that her husband is a loser.
Another failed politician who disappointed me is a man named Pete Dawkins, sometimes referred to as General Pete Dawkins. He led a charmed life—West Point cadet, Heisman trophy winner, Rhodes scholar, but as I found out, Pete was also a stiff. When he was running for the U.S. Senate in New Jersey against Frank Lautenberg, a magazine called
One day, Dawkins came to my office and asked me to help him build the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in lower Manhattan. He asked for a million dollars (or more) because he said he was having bad luck raising money.
I decided to help because no soldiers have ever been treated worse than the courageous people who came back from Vietnam, wounded and maimed, attacked physically abroad and psychologically at home. I provided over a million dollars in matching grants, and, almost as important, I helped get it built by using the best contractors in the city, along with unions who made sure it was constructed swiftly, properly, and cost-effectively. At the opening, Pete Dawkins took the credit.
Many years later, he was working as a high-ranking executive at Citibank and I phoned him to ask a small favor, to find something out for me. He didn’t respond for a while, so I called him two more times. Finally, he said, I really can’t do it for you, Donald, and I really don’t want to get involved. I told Dawkins that the
Sometimes you have to hold a grudge.
The hugely successful Miss Universe Pageant. From left to right: Charles Gargano, Stephanie Seymour, Evander Holyfield, Miss Universe Wendy Fitzwilliams, me, and NFL great Bruce Smith. Also pictured: Kylie Bax (third from right) and Sirio Maccioni (far right).
Learn the Value of Saying No
I purchased the Miss Universe Organization in 1996 and immediately sold half of the company to CBS; so not only were they our broadcaster, they were a co-owner as well. This kind of arrangement, where the network actually owns the end product, was a fairly new concept and should have been a win-win situation, since CBS would actually be able to eliminate the middleman and pay a lower license fee while, in theory, the network, as an owner, would look to maximize all promotional opportunities.
The partnership was a great concept, but after five years, it had not gone as planned. CBS was not willing to promote the shows to my satisfaction. As more and more cable competition ate into the network’s market share, on-air promotion became all the more important to sustain viewership, but it just wasn’t happening. To make matters worse, CBS tried to change the shows drastically by making them MTV-style music specials and dramatically cutting the time allotted to show the women competing. I am not a network programmer, but it seemed to me that people might be tuning in to a beauty competition to see beautiful women.
I am not saying a television musical performance is a bad thing; there have been some great ones over the years. A perfect example was the 1999 Miss Teen USA pageant: A year earlier, the teen show had introduced a little-known boy band called
