How Buffett acquired Helzberg's Diamonds · Transcript · BuffettMungerGPT

WarrenJust shortly after the annual report was issued, we completed a transaction with Heelsberg's Diamonds with Barnett Heelsberg, who's here today, and Barnett, would you stand up, please? There he is. Give him a hand. You may be interested in how it came about, because Barnett attended two of the last three meetings of Berkshire. He had a few shares in an IRA account, and he was here last year. Shortly after this meeting, I was back in New York City, and I was crossing the street at 58th Street right near the Plaza Hotel on Fifth Avenue. And a woman said, Mr. Buffett, I turned around, and she came up, she said she'd attended the annual meeting last year, or a few days ago, and said that she enjoyed, and I said, that's terrific. And I started across again, and Barnett had been about 30 or 40 feet away. I didn't know him. And he had heard this, woman, so he, he said the same thing, and I turned around, and we shook hands, first time I met him, and he said, you know, he said, I might have a business you'd be interested in. And I get that all the time, so I said, well, why did you write me? And a time went by, and I got a letter from Barnett, and he'd been thinking about doing something with the business. His father had started in 1950, and based in Kansas City, all that whole time. And he had been exploring various avenues, but probably in some part because of his background as a Berkshire shareholder, he had some specific interest in the company becoming associated with Berkshire. He cared very much about the company having a permanent home. He cared very much about it having an environment in which it could grow and be run autonomously and be based in Kansas City. And he wanted to receive something in exchange that he was happy to own for the rest of his life. And so we worked out a transaction shortly just very shortly after the annual report went to press. And so now Berkshire, as of 1201, I guess, yesterday morning, the deal closed. Now Berkshire is the owner of Hellsburg's Diamonds, which has roughly 150 stores around perhaps 26 or 27 states. I'm not sure the exact number, and mostly in malls, although some others. It's been enormously successful. It's got a magnificent morale, organizational structure, and the people. Barnett That was very generous with people in making the sale. He took it out of his own pocket to treat people right because they've done such a terrific job over the years. And I think you'll see Hellsburg become a very big factor in Berkshire over time, and it just shows you what can come out of these annual meetings. So the rest of you are, you know, do your stuff.