Name: How George Foreman went from knockout artist to business champion
Uploaded: 2015-03-06
Duration: 4 min 18 s
Description: Fortune and Sport Illustrated join up to talk with the two-time World Heavyweight Champion about his successes in boxing and in business.

[ MUSIC ] It's so strange about my life. It started so long ago. It's almost hard to remember but it started rough. Without even a thought of dreaming. And then all of a sudden success in boxing and then in business. Life has been fine. George Foreman grew up in the fifth ward of Houston downtown. Dropped out of school at 15 and he wasn't quite sure what he was going to do in life. The story goes that Foreman found himself. At the job core. Ready to join, looking for any kind of work. But he was also an intimidating scrappy guy who got in to fights. He kind of stumbled in to boxing because it was his only out. I never did see a day that I was going to do so well. But I always had big hopes. Foreman was known not for being necessarily the best fighter, but being one of the hardest punchers. His early career was nothing but success after success. At 19, he got an olympic gold medal in Mexico City and he went 40- 0 in the ring before he fought Joe Frazier for his first heavyweight title. Now when I first became the heavyweight champ of the world, I had no idea, nothing whatsoever of the success that would follow me later on. Of course, I was 25. I didn't even know that anything existed endorsement. All I cared about was getting that right hand in and getting the knockout. Nothing else mattered. When George Foreman was in the early days of his boxing career, he was known not just for being an intimidating fighter, but even kind of a bad guy. It wasn't actually until 1987 when Foreman was making his return to boxing that Madison Avenue took note. He had successfully changed his image from scowling and angry and intimidating to smiling and sunny and approachable. I heard a lady say years back her dad had told her, learn to sale and you will never starve. And I sold the world on the look, I can be heavy weight champion of the world. Madison Avenue picked up on that. And there were Doritos. McDonald's. Pepsi. Meineke. Oscar Meyer Weiner hot dogs. He was selling clothing with Casual Male. He's always been a salesman. By George, I think he's got it. The whole advertising world was right there with me. And I made a lot of money and met a lot a friends. Oh, I had a wonderful time endorsing products. And that was a thrill because every young boy, especially when I was growing up in Houston, every boy wanted to be on television. Even at 45, I was still that boy. I was endorsing everything and one friend told he said, look. George you're making all of these companies wealthy why don't you get your own product and make yourself wealthy. We formed a joint venture, really, where all of us would put in. I put the name and the work into building this little product. I didn't like it at first. My wife said it was a great thing because the grease would go out of it but yet the meat would stay juicy. She sold me on it. George Foreman lean mean fat reducing grilling machine, it worked and what 100 million grills later it's the talk of the town. So after Foreman regained the heavy weight title when he was 45 years old he had a couple more fights, left the sport, and I think the transition into business was seamless and automatic. Automatic. He had already had this grill come along that now bore his name and was selling like crazy. And advertisers still wanted to be involved with this guy who had turned himself into a sunny, likeable, marketable face. Having my dad's philosophy in business, one that he's given to me and all my brothers really he gave us a name. George Edward Foreman. He let us wear that like a badge. And what that represents is quality, integrity, and trust. You know, the most important thing to me is always stay small and humble if you want to be successful in business. I think even though George Foreman may not be remembered as being the greatest boxer of all time, most boxers from the past and from the present would agree that he brought big time marketability. [ INAUDIBLE ] He made his face into something that could be boxed and sold by advertisers and brands, and he's embraced that. And I think in the end he proved that there's life outside the ring. You go through life, you get knocked down a lot, you get hit a lot, you get so many disappointment, but I'd learn in the ring, you just gotta get up and. Swing, swing, swing, swing and if you dedicate yourself not so much to winning but to swinging, you're gonna win [ LAUGH ] [ MUSIC ]

Fortune and Sport Illustrated join up to talk with the two-time World Heavyweight Champion about his successes in boxing and in business.