BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts.

Hi there, I'm Ed Butler.

Welcome to Business Daily from the BBC World Service.

On today's program, we're meeting a former retail boss, Lou Frankfort.

Our philosophy was to bring together a microcosm of America in terms of a very diverse workforce that reflected the population, value-based, and we built a meritocracy.

The meritocracy he's talking about was coach, the so-called affordable luxury handbag brand,

which CEO Liu has transformed from a small family-run operation into a $5 billion business.

We don't have a history of luxury in the United States.

What we wanted to do, and others have done this

as well, other brands and businesses, is create a product that could be accessible and affordable

to a good portion of the population. Lou Frankfort looks back on his life and his 35-year career at Coach,

and although the idealistic hopes of a better future he once had age 13 may have faded,

he's still optimistic for the future.

That's all to come on today's Business Daily Meets from the BBC.

It began after World War II. I was born in 1946, and my parents lived in the Bronx, which is one of the boroughs of New York City,

my father in New York City policeman, my mother, a homemaker,

and we lived in an apartment building with about 20 other families.

I grew up in a working class family.

I was a late talker,

and I had speech impediments that I struggled with during my childhood,

and I was a late bloomer.

I had a happy childhood, and I was a late bloomer. I had a happy childhood. I really did not have any early dreams of what life could be like when I was a young child. I think a defining moment

...