It is true, money can definitely buy you the finer things in life. But there are things that cash no matter how many millions you may have to throw at it just cannot buy.
Trust and integrity are two such examples.
You may not be able to touch, taste or smell them but, believe me, they are the commodities on which many of the world’s great companies rely.
Those two little things are worth money on the balance sheet before you even start.
When consumers buy in to a brand and trust they are going to be delivered a faultless product or service, then that company is on to a winner.
When that same organisation then backs up the marketing hype and delivers for the customer time and again, the holy grail of customer retention happens.
Customers who return time and again with smiles on their faces are worth their weight in gold in the corporate world.
That’s why firms so fiercely protect their reputations through whatever means are necessary.
So when the bonds that tie company and customer together are broken, the consequences can be dire.
On Monday, Volkswagen one of the world’s most trusted brands was found to have rigged car emissions tests in America.
US regulators found it had used complex software to outsmart officials. Almost half a million diesel cars in the US are now suspected of pumping out far more pollutants than anyone suspected.
VW has the financial muscle to pay whatever fines comes its way.
But what it cannot put right overnight with a fistful of dollars is that trust bond with its customers. Its integrity is no longer intact.
Other scandal-hit multi-nationals and the UK’s major banks have found out the hard way that reputational damage can be the most costly of all.
The public don’t take kindly to being taken for fools.