Losing My Virginity

Richard Branson grew up in England in the 1950s and 1960s with dyslexia, at a time when schools weren't well prepared to deal with it, and he spent a good part of his classes reading slowly and getting bad grades in most subjects.

At sixteen he dropped out of school, a decision that back then sounded almost like a failure, but that he treated as the first sign that he learned faster by doing than by sitting at a desk listening to lectures. He had no guaranteed talent, just a stubborn urge to build something of his own before getting any diploma.

This beginning matters for the rest of the story because it explains a pattern that repeats throughout the whole book: Branson rarely tries to become a technical expert in any subject. He builds a team to cover what he doesn't know and focuses his own energy on selling the idea to the outside world.

While still in school, Branson and a classmate started the magazine Student, meant to talk to young people about politics, culture, and behavior in a language adults didn't use. There was no company structure at all: it was a bunch of teenagers chasing ads to pay the printer.

The way he sold ad space already showed what the rest of his career would look like: he called big companies directly, introduced himself with the confidence of someone with experience, and closed deals before the other side realized they were negotiating with a seventeen-year-old kid.

The magazine never became a runaway financial success, but it served as a hands-on school: it taught him how to raise funds, how to deal with late suppliers, and how to keep a project afloat even without spare money in the till.

In the early 1970s, a new law in England allowed records to be sold at a discount if the sale was made by catalog, outside a registered physical store. Branson saw a simple commercial loophole there: advertise records cheaper than any street shop and ship them by mail.

The business grew fast because it solved a real problem for the young consumers of the time, who wanted to pay less for music without giving up the latest releases. That mail-order business generated enough cash for him to dream of a real store.

An unexpected event almost ended everything right there: during a stretch of financial squeeze, he was caught falsely declaring a batch of records to avoid export tax, and was even detained for it. The family had to help cover the fine, an episode he himself treats as an embarrassment and a lesson about shortcuts that turn out expensive.