You have to worry about where the business is headed long-term.

Our attitude is that if you hire good people and pay them a fair wage, then good things will happen for the company.

Our attitude has always been that if you hire good people and provide good wages and good jobs and more than that - if you provide careers - that good things will happen to your company. I think we can say that that has been proved by the quality of people that we have and how they have built our organization.

In the final analysis, you get what you pay for.

You take an educated gamble. If you don't occasionally make a mistake, you're not doing your job.

There was a proposal in California that would keep out Wal-Mart but allow Costco. You opposed it. Are you nuts? That's true: I always oppose these kinds of things. Competition makes us better. Some of our best stores have a Sam's Club next door.

Obscene salaries send the wrong message through a company. The message is that all brilliance emanates from the top; that the worker on the floor of the store or the factory is insignificant.