Bad Buying – Three Months On

It is three months today as I write this since Bad Buying — How Organisations Waste Billions Through Failures, Frauds, and F*ck-ups hit the (largely virtual) shops.  Penguin have re-printed now, a sign that whilst it hasn’t challenged Richard Osman at the top of the best-seller charts, it has sold reasonably well. Many thanks to everyone who has bought it and even more so for those who have left reviews on Amazon and elsewhere (I’d love to know who “Geoff H” is though …)

My vision for the book was always to make it an ideal “impulse purchase” for any business person, or public sector manager, as they browsed in the airport or station bookshop.  I very much hoped professional procurement people would enjoy it and find it useful, but it was aimed at that wider audience too.

Well, not a lot of people have been wandering through stations or airports in the last three months! I hope that will change as we move through 2021, or “the year of vaccination” as it will surely become known. And I’m looking forward to having a one year anniversary “relaunch party” or two in October this year.

It was an experience to be interviewed live on the Jeremy Vine show, and even better that he appeared to have actually read the book! To be reviewed by Robert Colville in the Times was a thrill, as was seeing the book featured in a column from Luke Johnson in the Sunday Times.

But perhaps the best feeling comes when people I know – and indeed some I don’t – tell me they have enjoyed the book, or that they’ve bought it for colleagues, or even that they are recommending it to their students. A friend sent me the picture above showing the three books he got for Christmas – that’s interesting company to be keeping, to be sure!

I’m still collecting bad buying stories, so do let me know if you see any good examples.  And if by any chance you haven’t read the book yet… check out the links here.  And thanks again to everyone who has supported the venture.

 “A fascinating litany of the mistakes that can happen when buyers get it wrong” – Luke Johnson, The Sunday Times

“Packed full with amazing examples’ Jeremy Vine, BBC Radio 2

“Colossal, costly disasters could be averted if those holding the purse strings read this book”. – The Times