David Novak 0:02 

Hey everybody, you've heard me talk about your personal development plan on my podcast. Well, we've received such positive feedback about the plan that we've decided to actually make it an official resource out of it. We've created a weekly leadership plan you can have delivered to your inbox each week. The weekly leadership plan is a simple way you can develop yourself as a leader and put the practical skills we talked about on the podcast into practice. So each week, you'll get tips that will help you stay focused on the right things as a leader to get the weekly leadership plan just go to how leaders lead.com/plan and sign up. That's how leaders lead.com/plan Welcome to how leaders lead where every week you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world, I break down the key learning so that by the end of the episode, you'll have something simple you can apply as you develop into a better leader. That's what this podcast is all about. Today's guest is Bill acquavella, one of the most renowned art dealers in the world, and head of acquavella galleries, and the art business reputation is everything. Bill has sold hundreds of millions of dollars worth of art and his customers. People like Mick Jagger, Steve Wynn, and Henry Ford, the second, they have absolute trust in what they're buying from their confidence spending money with Bill like they do because the confidence they have earned him. So the question for all of us is how do we build up our reputations as leaders, where people will trust us in the big moments? Well, this is an episode chock full of stories from some of Bill's biggest deals, we can learn to build up trust by hearing how he built his up. It's true for buildings true for leaders, reputation is everything. This is one of my favorite all time interviews, and I can't wait for you to listen in. Here's my conversation with my good friend, and soon to be yours, Bill acquavella.

I always like to start out bill at the beginning. Tell us about your upbringing.

Bill Acquavella 2:13 

Well, you know, I'm an only child, my father came over from Naples, Italy and 9019. I was born in New York. And during the war, we moved out, like father said, We're gonna move the country moved to Jamaica, Queens was a country in those days. So I went to Catholic school out there. And when I was about an eighth grader, he pulled me out. And he sent me away to school, up to Westminster School in Simsbury, Connecticut. So he's very big on me getting an education as you might think, and making sure I graduated from college. You know, my father was always able to live well, but never have any money, kind of, you know, he was one of these guys, you know, I don't care if I'm not a millionaire, who just want to live like one. And he was very much along those lines, and he could do it. How much did

David Novak 3:05 

that really affect you and the way you thought about your future and the way you've lived your life?

Bill Acquavella 3:10 

It affected me a lot, because I remember my father always being short of cash. I saw the pain in that. And yet not he would never let on that to anyone else that he was short. So anyway, it goes on. I do ROTC in college, I go in the army for six months, you know, offers training course that kind of thing. And then I didn't have a job when I got out of the army. And my father said, Well, you come to the gallery until you get a job. And my father was an old master dealer, specializing in Italian Renaissance, Italian Baroque paintings. And in those days, they were they were more paintings and buyers. It's nothing like you read about today. There was no one who was going to get there first to get the payment it was where you're going to find the client that would like to buy it. So it was very hard to make money in that business at that time.

David Novak 4:03 

Did you always have an inkling that you would get into the family? No idea

Bill Acquavella 4:06 

I was gonna do it. I was the lead. I did major in art history in college. And I did paint a little bit. I took a studio board course. But that's not what I wanted to do. Can you give us

David Novak 4:18 

just a real quick and basic primer on on the key success factors in the Art Gallery business.

Bill Acquavella 4:24 

But you know, there are two kinds of business models in the art business. One is a primary dealer and what that is, is you represent artists and you basically in today's world, you try to have a lot of locations so you can entice artists like to come with you because you can show them in different locations. And then the second part is is the deal is a deal in secondary market, which I do. I just inventory paintings I buy and sell and also broker paintings, but I only have one location and I vote is believed in art. So I've always reinvested my own money in paintings, and never expanded in real estate was in different cities. But what I used to do to help me, I made arrangements with certain dealers around the world that we were friends and we became friends. And so you know, if I wanted to do something in London, I had a friend who had a gallery there, and we'd share and we do it there. If I wanted to do in Germany, I had the same at the same in Paris at the same in Italy, I had the same in Switzerland. And so that I had, in the early days, a way to be in all those countries, if I wanted, I just had to have a partner, which I shared the profits with for that particular picture that we were working on, or two or three pictures.

David Novak 5:44 

Now I understand, as you mentioned earlier, your dad specializes in works of the Italian Renaissance. And you said that was a pretty tough market. How did you go about expanding your opportunity when you really got involved in the gallery?

Bill Acquavella 5:57 

We start I started with my father in 1960, the end of 1960. And, you know, I just couldn't sell those things. So I said to him, Listen, I can't sell these things. I don't know who buys Italian res or giant Baroque pictures. He says, Well, what do you think you can sell? So well, I don't know. He said, we'll try to buy what you can sell. So I went to Paris and I bought a painting. And you know, the numbers were a lot different there. But, you know, I bought a painting for $8,000. I sold it for 12. And I said, Well, you know, now we might do some of this. So I started and then we we started going and we incorporated in 1963. For $93,000. That was our total business, the worth of our business. My father, being Italian, right after the war, bought a house in Italy, in a place called San Remo. It's for about a half hour from Monte Carlo on the Italian Riviera there, you know, terrific house. And he paid at that time was a million lira, which was $1,500. I bought in 1946. Wow. So every year, we used to go there, and he closed the gallery we go. So one year ago, and we stopped in Paris, and he would go looking for these old master paintings. And I met a young dealer at the time that was in Paris, my age. And he said, you know, the bone our estate has been in the courts for 15 years because the nieces of Madame Bon Ark, she contested the will. And they've now settled and they got half the estate and they want to sell some of the fixtures but they're very expensive. And all the dealers say they're too expensive and very difficult to deal with. So of course, I told my father that he immediately so we go, we're gonna go see him. We want to go so we go to the Chase Manhattan Bank, big vault, they're a big room. And he started pulling out these bone ours, Pierre bone art is, you know, post impressionist painter, and for those times very valuable. We incorporated for $93,000. So you know, there's not a lot of capital behind us. My father sees these paintings. So we pick out 17 paintings. And he says I'll buy the 17 paintings. And the price was $1 million. He says, but you got to lend me 13 others so I can have a show in New York. And I'll pay you in December after the show's over. And I was thinking myself, this is unbelievable. I mean, we have maybe $100,000 in the bank. Okay. So they sign the papers, and we take them. Okay, well, we now owe a million dollars. And we find down the sand rainbow. And I say to him, you know, no one's doing color catalogues here. Why don't we at least do a color catalog? This guy's a colorist. That's what he's known for. So we do we print an all color catalog. We print it in Italy, because it was cheaper. And I come back to New York and I have him here. And I pick out 10 names. Not knowing any of them, okay, but I picked out the richest people I could get that collected art. And on that list were Norton Simon, David Rockefeller, Paul Mellon, and I come back to New York and I send a letter out and I say, listen, we're having an exhibition of these. They're all for sale from the estate. And I know you're in Sinaloa, and I thought I'd give you the first opportunity should you be interested to see the pictures first is then 10 letters and 10 catalogs. And the exhibition hadn't even opened yet. And the door opens one day I'm sitting in the gallery and in comes as a Mr. Mellon. Yes, sir. Come right in. And I got your letter like to see the bone or the first picture I showed him. So I liked that. I liked the Biden it was $135,000. And now I'm saying you know, do I show him anymore? I don't want to lose this deal. Yeah, this is unbelievable. He's shown resin he buys $1 million. You're on a roll one million dollars of those pictures on that one day came in. And that got us over the hill and added that show we made like $300,000 At that time, you gotta come really gotta start.

David Novak 10:12 

You have any other stories couple other stories of that big deal.

Bill Acquavella 10:15 

So the following year I went to London, and I walk in this dealer. And there's a fountain Latour, on the floor that he's a still life painter. a printing company has just been sold. And they say that the previous CEO had bought these fontanella tours with company money. So I have 15 of them that he wants to sell. So I said the same thing my father did said, Okay, I'll 15 And I brought him back and I borrowed a few others from collectors. And I sold out the whole show. In fact, there was a decorator in town called Macmillan, and they bought the catalog, and they would frame the color photographs, and they would put it on people's tables is it little decorations, so I know what catalogs, so we had a lot of fun with those great start

David Novak 11:03 

date build, you try to find emerging artists or do you focus on sourcing work from already famous artists.

Bill Acquavella 11:12 

Now, we just stayed pretty much with a master's in all fields. We have expanded a little bit we have represented one or two people, our biggest artists that we represented was Lucien Freud. I mean, Lucien Trogir is well established English artist, friend of bacon's, he was difficult. I did a lot of male nudes, you know, and female nudes. And so the subjects were sometimes a little difficult. So people in London, the dealers were a little hesitant when he had broken up with his previous dealer. Long story short, I go over there. He wants to have lunch, me, I've loved him, I'd met him a couple of times at a friend's house and he puts up some pictures. As a studio, I go see him, they were unbelievable. I mean, they were big size paintings, a performance artist called Leigh Bowery, and he did four pictures of this huge guy all naked. And they sound difficult. They weren't difficult, but they were still great art. And so I told him, I'll buy those three pictures from you. And I'll buy everything you make for two years. And this was 1992. So by then we had the wherewithal to do that. So I said, you know, buy everything you make for two years you price. And also, I'll tell you the story selling the pictures at $600,000. And the first one that finally got up there, first one came up at auction for 30 million. This was this was about 10 years later, 15 years later. Now the record price at auction is I think 57 million.

David Novak 12:43 

So this was really sort of a gutsy move, you're ready to step out and really supporting artists that other people can kind of scare them off, you know, how do you build? How do you determine what's really good? And how do you develop an AI and expertise to judge works like that to say, hey, it's worth the risk. For some reason,

Bill Acquavella 13:00 

I kind of had an eye and a feeling for it. I don't think it's anything that I studied for, I think I just kind of had that knack. And you know, I'm not scared of risk. And my father was a gambler. I mean, that's why I later found out that's why we pretty much were always tapped out. He had a great reputation. You know, I mean, one of the things he told me when I started working, we said, look, we got only one thing, that's our reputation, said, You can't fool with that. You've got to buy them and do the best you can. And you know, it's all relationships in our business. Now. You meet people that want to buy art and collect, they commit a lot of money. And so they have to trust the dealer. And they don't know that much all the time. So you know, it's easy for a dealer to take advantage. Somebody you know, that's one thing you don't want to do. And I'm gonna go for one time hit. I mean, you want to develop a client and a deal. And so we were lucky we did that

David Novak 13:59 

you sold your paintings to very sophisticated collectors. You mentioned Rockefeller. I know, Henry Ford, a second was one of your clients. What's the key to selling to such sophisticated buyers?

Bill Acquavella 14:12 

Well, for one thing, if you have the art is the door opener, if there it's in really good art. And then you have to have a reputation that you're not his person. I mean, it sounds crazy, but it's a big part of our business. You've got to be able to trust people. If you're a collector or who you're buying from the business has changed a lot now because the auction houses came in, and the auction houses were always a wholesale market. That's where dealers want to buy things amongst other places. But once Alfred Taubman bought some of these, he started changing it into a retail business because what he did, he would allow people to take the paintings before the auction to their houses to see if it fit. He would make sure the paintings were cleaned you would reframe them. tavern was a good friend of mine in fact, when He bought the business. He wanted to buy my business one way to run salaries for him. And I didn't particularly want to work for him, although he's a good friend of mine. So I just stayed with my business, but he was really the one who got the art market change. And now Christie's and Sotheby's are tremendous forces in our market.

David Novak 15:20 

You know, let's go back to a deal that I know that you made that really it was with subsidies. It really disrupted the art world at the time. And I think you did this in 1990. Tell us about this deal where you really were the first to really Co Op someone like Sotheby's?

Bill Acquavella 15:35 

Well, it's a funny story. I, you know, that time I made some investments with people outside the business outside the art business. And I invested with Julian Robertson with Stan Druckenmiller, and I was watching how they were doing these leveraged buyouts, you know, and so there was a big French dealer called the son of Henri Matisse. His name was Pierre Matisse. He had a gallery in New York and he represented very good artists. He had Giacometti and Miro, Chagall, and tongi. And I'm, I can go on and on, I mean, really good, good paintings. And when he died, and those days you had to go Subchapter S, if you're going to be able to really handle if someone dies and family. Otherwise, it's double taxation. And it was anyway, there was, so I decided, why not just by the gallery from the estate, you know, so then I'll have to pay the taxes, and they, and they were getting hit like $12 million a month. So it was they were anxious to do so. So they were a few other people also interested at the time. But there were 4700 items and the deal. Okay, so I couldn't handle that in terms of I could keep track of it all. And my goal I have, I have 20 to 25 people working for me in those days, I had maybe 20, maybe 15. And I just couldn't. So I went to salaries. And I said, Listen, I got a deal. You want to make a deal. And he Taubman and CEO said, Sure. So I said, Okay, I'll do it on one deal, you got to put up all the money. And I gotta be in charge of the deal. Because I didn't want them to do it. You know, they're good, but they're not that good. That's too much money. So anyway, they agreed and they they issued some commercial paper, we ended up buying the whole thing. 453 million. And it was the first time a dealer in the art auction got together. And that really caused a stir all the dealers was screaming at me, you know why you're going there our enemy kind of thing? Wrong. If we don't get with gun with them, we're going to be alone. That went very well. I mean, we had to sell $300 million worth to break even. And I sold 300 million in 18 months.

David Novak 17:51 

How do you go about moving that much inventory that fast? And what kind of skin in the game did you have in that deal?

Bill Acquavella 17:57 

I had 15 million that was that. But that doesn't matter. I couldn't lose. I mean, if I lost there was more than my skin over the 15 million. I mean, you're out of a lot of trouble there. But anyway, what happened? How do you sell all that? Right? It's a big problem. So what I did, I made packages up. I mean, I had 550 murals in there. Okay, so I made packages of murals, I made packages of sugar panels of everything. So no one could buy one picture, they had to buy the whole package. Now, this is a time when the Japanese have been buying a lot. And I was doing a lot of business in Japan, that suddenly has had incorporation in Nevada. And we, we did this deal in Nevada, I went out to Nevada, I got a warehouse out there where we could keep all the stuff. And then I found a very nice gallery, about one block away from the warehouse, you know, so I went in there. And there was this nice couple. And I say got an idea for you. You want to listen to a deal. So sure. So I said, How about we work, we buy you for two years or three years, we'll cover all your expenses, we'll do everything for two or three years. I wanted to use them to display the work I tell you know. So what I did, these Japanese would come over to New York, I charter a gulf stream, I get them on the Gulf Stream on the Gulf Stream, I had these albums, which had the packages in the beach, and they'd go through these out and pick out what packages they wanted. They picked out a package and I call the head they'd get it out of the warehouse, they'd hang the whole gallery with that package. So we'd get out there and then they'd see the whole thing. And on the way back we I started selling these packages to the Japanese It was great.

David Novak 19:43 

You're known for being an incredible salesperson, you know, what do you think really makes a great salesperson What advice would you give people on how to really get good at selling?

Bill Acquavella 19:53 

That's a difficult question. I mean, they're all different kinds of salespeople as you know, I mean, everybody has their own technique. You You gotta have something that you think people want to buy, you gotta believe in the thing you're selling. If someone gives you something you don't believe in, it's pretty hard to sell, I can't sell something, I don't believe. And so you just have to believe in something, you have to have a reason you believe in it. And you use that to convince the other guy that each of that happened.

David Novak 20:19 

Can you tell us a story about your most challenging private sale?

Bill Acquavella 20:23 

Steve Wynn, who is a big client of mine and a friend. I mean, I sold the picture for him up because So I sold it for $139 million dollars. I mean, this is all public knowledge numbers. So I'm not talking about a school. And the money was coming in the next day. And I'm at home, and I get a call after dinner. And it's Steve. And he says, Bill, I've just put my elbow through the painting. I say, Come on, Steve, is not finding the money's coming tomorrow. Yeah, he's sometimes you I thought I'd put him a joke. So no, it's true. And oh, my god, I can't believe it. So of course, the deal fell through. And I restored the picture for him, had restored and collected as insurance. It was an incredible accident. He's vision impaired, and now he's almost totally blind. So that was that he took the picture back. And then two years later, I resold it for 155 million for

David Novak 21:30 

I was gonna ask you how you got over the loss of closing a deal like that. It didn't take you too long.

Bill Acquavella 21:35 

Well, it took maybe maybe it was three years. I don't remember two or three years.

David Novak 21:40 

But how did you mentally work through that? I mean, that had to be a huge disappointment.

Bill Acquavella 21:44 

Well, I tell you, in the art business, when you're dealing those things, you win some and lose some all the time, you kind of get used to it. I'm pretty hardened on some of that stuff. Like you can get your dad and in the early days, you would get your dad big time. So

David Novak 21:58 

the time and grade help you deal with those ups and success. I imagined.

Bill Acquavella 22:03 

Well, it just gonna it's gonna happen sometimes. But not that way. I hopefully,

David Novak 22:08 

I heard about a painting that you are going to sell to Mick Jagger, that also kind of fell through the cracks. Can you tell us a little bit about that one.

Bill Acquavella 22:18 

So this was a Lucien Freud painting. And Mick had married Jerry Hall, and I'll be married, but he had a baby with her. And Lucien Freud was doing a composition. And it had a man on a couch reading a book and a dog under the couch. And in the mid ground, it had Jerry Hall nursing her baby. And then behind was the open window to a street in London. And it was a big picture, maybe 88 inches high, and about 40 inches wide. And so, you know, he was a very slow painter. And a painting like that would take maybe two years to do. I mean, where a person would sit there maybe once or twice a month for him, but you know, for many, many months, and then Mick Jagger wanted to buy the picture. He kept calling me up like I want to buy the past. MC I don't even have a price on it because it's not finished yet. And he was bugging me. So I call up Lucien Freud. I said, Listen lotion that, you know, make wants to buy this picture. You know, let's, let's put a price on it, sell it to him. So we do. We put a price on it, we sell it to him. And of course, there's more to be done. So the more time go by and I'm at home one time in New York, I get a call from Freud. And he says, Bill, I want you to be the first to know the pictures had a sex change. I said, What are you talking about? And he said, Well, Jerry hold and show up for two sittings. So I changed her head into a man I put David Dawson, which was the studio assistant. I put his head on her body. Okay, well then Jagger calls um, so yeah, you know, what, what is this? What's going on? What can we do is is ridiculous. You've been sitting there for four months? Is it MC there's nothing I can do. Obviously, you don't have to buy the picture. But there's nothing I can do. Because Freud was like that. I mean, he was you couldn't tell Freud with. That was an embarrassing situation. But anyway, I had to buy the picture from Lucien and I thought, I'll never sell this picture. And you know what, the first person I showed it to, when it arrived in New York bought the picture.

David Novak 24:33 

What was it that was the clincher for the story behind it?

Bill Acquavella 24:36 

Well, actually, no, that was not the clincher, but it helped. It was a fun story. And they enjoyed that. That the fact that they had turned Jerry's head into a

David Novak 24:47 

nail, how often do you find that kind of emotion those little storylines, the things that personalize a picture, how often does that really proved to be the thing that really gets someone to want to invest in a major pain? it usually isn't the

Bill Acquavella 25:01 

major thing, but it doesn't hurt. A lot of times. I mean, obviously people buy those pictures because of the quality of the painting, and the work of the artists. But a little story, a little romance like that always helps.

David Novak 25:16 

Well, I know you've added your daughter, Eleanor and sons, Nicholas and Alexandra did the business. What's the biggest challenge running a successful family business? And what advice can you give to others? You know, we have a lot of people who listen in their part of family businesses,

Bill Acquavella 25:30 

I don't know if there's any real advice to give on that other than in my case, I never tried to get them in business, that they just follow me in one at a time. And my last one, Alexander, he didn't want to do it. So he went to Wall Street for a while, and then he decided to come in and what I tried to do for him in business, you're gonna have to buy and sell a painting, there's no way you're going to make money. And so they had to learn how to be individual dealers on their own. So I let them buy and sell what they liked, which is not necessarily exactly what I like. And all I would do is I tried to protect him from a total disaster, but I would let little disasters happen. So they kind of get a feeling that disaster can happen. By now they luckily they have established themselves in the trade, which is very important, because if other dealers don't respect you, you're not really a dealer.

Speaker 1 26:33 

We'll be back with the rest of my conversation with Bill acquavella In just a moment. When we talk about reputation being everything. What we're really talking about here is trust. Do people really trust you? In my conversation with Stephen, Mr. Covey, the former president, CEO of Franklin Covey leadership, our entire conversation was about trust, and how to cultivate even more of it as a leader, clearly you need to be trustworthy. That's the starting point. But you've got to also be trusting. You got to be willing to extend that trust. There's a risk to trust and there's a risk not to trust. And I think not trusting is the greater risk in today's world, a collaborative, interdependent world with multiple generations, characterized by disruption, and we need change. We need innovation, we need collaboration, and you gotta trust to create that. Go back and listen to my conversation with Stephen Mr. Covey, Episode 41, here on how leaders lead.

David Novak 27:33 

You know, you mentioned other dealers, how have you always looked at your competition? How much did it really affect what you did?

Bill Acquavella 27:39 

I mean, it affected me in that they were very tough competitors, as you might imagine, especially now. Now, there are many buyers, and not so many paintings of the quality that everybody wants. So the competition to get those paintings is very difficult.

David Novak 27:57 

Are people today more collectors passionate about art? Or they investors? What do you see happening?

Bill Acquavella 28:04 

Well, in the early days, I would say that most people were collectors 80 80% of them were collectors and some bought pains to keep up with the Joneses and others bought them for investment. Today, I think it's the complete opposite. I think 85% of the people buy for investment. And very few people buy it for social reasons, and a few people buy because they're actually passionate about art. The money has gotten so big, and I'm talking about the field that we deal in, which is the masters of 1920s etching and post war. I mean, they've sold a Warhol portrait of Marilyn Monroe, that was I think, 17 inches or 20 inches, and I got 230 million for it. So you know, they've turned it into an alternative investment for sure.

David Novak 28:54 

You've worked with so many renowned leaders and famous people. What do you see as let's say, the top three characteristics of those that you admire the most?

Bill Acquavella 29:03 

It's hard not to be impressed by someone's success and the wealth that they've created. doesn't always make them a great guy, or a genius. But the best people I've I think they get along with other people very well. You know, they know how to handle other personalities, and they're very articulate about expressing their ideas and what they want to do. I think it's really pretty easy once you meet a really successful person to say he's really a good CEO or you know, others talk a lot but nothing happens. You probably know better than I do because you you're close.

David Novak 29:45 

Thank you have evolved bill as a leader over the years, your own personal leadership style.

Bill Acquavella 29:51 

Well, I don't know that I you know, I'm not leading a lot of people. I mean, I have a small business, a family business, but I always get along well with people you No, it's much easier to be friendly with everybody and have an enemy. I'm interested in people, I like to know what they do, how they do it, and not an envious person about anyway, I'm fascinated by LIDAR success, how they do it. And I tried to learn from them.

David Novak 30:15 

How do you stay on top of the business trends, because you've seen a lot changed since you got into business and 61.

Bill Acquavella 30:22 

For my business, I have to travel we do a lot in Europe. In the old days, the art market was very inefficient. I mean, you'd go go to Paris, buy something, bring it back profit. i Goodbye did something to Germany sell in Italy, profit. I mean, now, with the new technology and everything, the markets very efficient. Everybody knows what everything is worth. So now, you have to know what you're doing. If you're going to buy and sell things,

David Novak 30:49 

how much did the internet and digital How much did that change or impact you and your company

Bill Acquavella 30:55 

has changed us a lot, it's very much part of our business. Now. I mean, like, you know, the old days, you would send a photograph to someone that you want to sell a painting, and then he'd send you back a letter sometimes, or he'd send you back. A telex in the old days, you know, now for my iPhones, and this phone right here that I have in my hand, I sell paintings anywhere in the world, I've sold them in China, I've sold them, you know, because the image is so perfect. And then two seconds later, they call you back. But what does that do, but the time changes and everything, that you're working twice as hard as you've ever worked, if you're going to do everything, and you probably know that better than anybody,

David Novak 31:35 

you know, I would imagine that the availability of high value works of art would be much greater than today than it was maybe a year or two ago. Is that the case?

Bill Acquavella 31:45 

I mean, there are different kinds of paintings as far as classifications of paintings, you know, contemporary painting, where the artist is painting and he gives galleries, exhibitions of his work, and they sell that that's called a primary that's suffered some I think, in this world quite a bit. If you get a trophy today, what I mean by a trophy, a great Picasso, a great Van Gogh, or great Monet, or, you know, a really major picture, you can sell it.

David Novak 32:13 

Are there more of those trophies available today or not? No, no,

Bill Acquavella 32:17 

it's harder and harder all the time. What's the biggest cause of that

David Novak 32:20 

you think? Well, most

Bill Acquavella 32:21 

of them end up in museums, eventually. And the people that have bought them in the last 30 years, have been extremely successful, wealthy people. So they're in very strong hands, and they don't sell. It's very hard to get them.

David Novak 32:37 

You know, I understand that you told me the story is great story about you had a portrait of your father painted. And Wendy and I, when we were able to see your gallery, and you were kind enough to show us around, we saw the painting, it was really neat. It's a cool thing to do. What's the story behind?

Bill Acquavella 32:55 

I had a lot of conflicts with my father. We were very close. But in business, we argued a lot about things he wanted to do one way I want to do it another way. And so we used to get in some pretty ugly fights. And at one point, you know, we weren't talking and it was a very difficult time. And I'd played golf at a detail with a friend of mine, who was much older night was Donald grant used to be at fallen stock and company and he was a wise old man. And we were driving out to the country. And I was telling him about my father and he said, You know something, what you will really do is have someone paint a portrait of your father. You know, I started thinking about and I said, you know, this really, this is a good idea. So I went and I told my father, you know, I'd really like to have a portrait done of them. And there was an artist called William Draper, who was a portrait painter. And we commissioned a portrait of my father. And he loved I mean, we were great pals. Again, it

David Novak 33:56 

takes a little art to bring people together. You know, speaking of going to your gallery, I was blown away by the gallery and the way you presented the art but you also have like an incredible location. tell our listeners where your gallery is located and how you found it.

Bill Acquavella 34:13 

Well, we're located at 79th street between Madison and fifth. We're very near the Metropolitan Museum near the Miracle Mile. They are museums. The building was a gallery for Duveen. Duveen was a very big time dealer in the 19th century and early 20th century, and his gallery had moved there. And Norton Simon was one of the big collectors in the 60s and he bought Duveen gallery. And he bought the building he bought the library, bought the inventory, everything but last time and he sold off the library and he kept the paintings he wanted and the building was for sale. So my father at the time said we are to buy this building and I have to tell you go back to the fact that we didn't really have a lot of money in those days. Anyway, the building costs $550,000. And we made a deal with Simon we gave him a Renoir of Fontaine Latour, and I borrowed $175,000. From the dime Savings Bank, I got a mortgage with a balloon at the end, and we've kept the building ever since.

David Novak 35:25 

Did you live right across the street from that building?

Bill Acquavella 35:28 

I did. I actually, when I got married, we moved in that building. 21, East 79th. And my mother and father actually moved in at 3179. So we all live right across from the front of the gallery.

David Novak 35:45 

And for our listeners out there, this is like the prime real estate in New York. You're about a stone's throw away from the museums and Central Park. It's absolutely incredible, pretty good real estate deal. Maybe you should have gotten in the real estate bill, maybe, maybe you know, what would be a sale that you should have had your opinion that just didn't happen. It was

Bill Acquavella 36:07 

a Mary Lasker, she was a collector in New York and she had eight Matisse is and I was dealing with her to buy the eight Matisse is I was probably 30 years old at the time, and there was a dealer in London, who called me up and said, Look, I'm dealing with her. Let me finish dealing with her. And then you can join us and put the pictures I said, okay, so he ends up buying the pictures, but he never let me in the deal. I lost, much I could do. Would you learn from that, never to trust that guy.

David Novak 36:45 

You know, speaking and trust, integrity has to be the number one thing and your

Bill Acquavella 36:51 

reputation. That reputation is extremely important. And really is I mean, if you have a good reputation, people believe you and they trust you. And you know, and you want to do a good job for him because they come back, they're happy. That's the key to being I think, successful in the art business.

David Novak 37:10 

You know, I remember you telling me a story about where a little bit of booze got in the way of a big sale to

Bill Acquavella 37:15 

again, we were in London and there was a dealer there that I did a lot of business with. And we had bought a Matisse together. And there was a Japanese fellow called Mr. Fuji, who was interested in buying impressionist and modern pictures. And so we wanted to sell him this picture. And in London, those days, everybody would have big lunches with wine and everything and have their clients in. So we invited Mr. Fuji in for lunch. And, of course, the line came out and Mr. Fuji enjoyed the wine, he had two friends with him. And they were all enjoying the wine. And I was rather concerned because I wanted to sell the picture. Because again, I needed the money. So we finally get downstairs. And they brought out a vintage brandy that they thought he should have. So he took a sip of that. And he literally just fell over the chair. And the two people wouldn't picked him up and said Mr. Fuji have very bad cold and drag them out. And he never bought the picture. The learning there did not serve alcohol. Sure.

David Novak 38:26 

You know, when you look at the world, where's the hotspot in art these days? I mean, when you look at

Bill Acquavella 38:32 

states still still and will be I think we've done business in Middle East we've done visited Asia, and good business. But still the United States right now is still the best collectors are here.

David Novak 38:45 

But when you look back in your career, what did you love most about your business?

Bill Acquavella 38:49 

First of all, I love art. I mean, I love dealing in it. And I love the people I meet. I mean great people when I was a kid, Henry Ford was pal of mine. Because, you know, we talked about it, but then he left the home, we'd go out at night together, we used to have a great time, we'd meet in Paris, we'd be in London. And so we became friends, you could have never done that unless you were in a business where he you know, he was interested in it.

David Novak 39:14 

What did you like least about your business?

Bill Acquavella 39:18 

There's a lot of monkey business in our business. You know, I mean, they're not they're not always a lot of good guys.

David Novak 39:24 

What bits of advice bill would you give to aspiring leaders?

Bill Acquavella 39:27 

I don't think in being a leader if you don't have ambition. That day that I mean, unless you're willing to and believe in are obsessed, but what you want to do in today's world with a competition we have, you're gonna have a tough time. I tell my kids that all the time. Say you look around in our toughest competitors. They're obsessed. They don't quit at five o clock. They're going all the time. So obsession, essentially the passion to do it. You got to have a passion and you have to have the mission to 100 succeed. What do you think?

David Novak 40:02 

Well, you know, I think people who are obsessed and passionate and can't wait to go to work on what they do, I think that's a key trait for any successful person.

Bill Acquavella 40:10 

I really believe that. I mean, I think we, you and I love to play golf, and you're a good golfer, and I'm a struggling golfer, okay. But you know, I don't want to work on it until I get better at it. And I'm 81 years old, and I'm still trying to get better, you know. And no one's gonna succeed if they don't want to get better and try and have the ambition to improve. You know,

David Novak 40:30 

Bill, I understand you, you have a phenomenal personal collection. You also said you said early, you hang on to a lot of paintings and keep them. So I have to ask you this, if you had one painted, you'd want to display in your house, what would it be and why?

Bill Acquavella 40:44 

The three painters that I have collected, and others but in majority in my house are Picasso, Matisse, and Miro, those are the three I've always liked. And I bought a lot of those. And I've kept them. And the first painting I bought by Picasso was adore Amar of 1938. With a red blouse and a purple hat on a chair that looks like a Van Gogh chair, we yellow jam. It's a cool picture, which I like, that's probably my favorite picture.

David Novak 41:16 

That's great. Let me close by asking you this bill. You know, what's, what's your unfinished business? When you look at your life, where you're headed, what do you want to get done that you haven't done yet?

Bill Acquavella 41:27 

I just want to keep improving what I have. And you know, I wanna I want to make sure we have good art to sell. I like it. I like doing what I'm doing. And it you know, I don't know how much longer I have going, but I'm going to try to go as long as I can. It's fun. Yeah, maybe I can turn you into a collection. I

David Novak 41:44 

don't know, I think I don't think I could afford. But I will tell you this. I'm glad I pulled your arm. And I'm glad I asked you to do this podcast because I've learned a lot that I didn't know, you obviously are a great leader in your industry. And I appreciate you taking the time to share some of your experiences and insights. It's been

Bill Acquavella 42:04 

fun. Thanks for having me.

David Novak 42:14 

Can you believe some of those stories, it's pretty incredible. The bill has been able to accomplish all he's accomplished in the art world. But I think it's important to note he's been at this for a long time. Building your reputation is all about the long game, even when you have to suffer short term losses. Think back to that elbow. Picasso story. When things went south Bill dealt with the issue immediately, he made a call to the buyer to let them know what had happened, which I can imagine it was a very difficult call to make. But not only this, he worked with Steve Wynn to correct his mistake by having the painting restored so they could sell it again, at an even higher price. Bill tackle the issue head on to maintain his integrity and reputation with people on both sides of the situation. There's so much to learn here from Bill that can help you develop as a leader. Here's something simple you can apply this week to put some of this into practice. The next time you face the challenge, I want you to face it head on, make the hard phone call and do the extra work to correct the mistake if that's what's needed. And here's why you build trust when you address tough situations directly and swiftly. It's the pathway to building a rock solid reputation as a leader. So do you want to know how leaders lead? What we learned today is that for great leaders, reputation is everything. Thanks again for tuning in to another episode of how leaders lead where every Thursday you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world. I make it a point to give you something simple on each episode that you can apply to your business so that you will become the best leader you can be. I'll see you next week.