Let's be serious. The biggest current challenge facing this business is the economy. Who knows where it's going to go? In my view, in 15 months time, this hiatus will have gone, the clouds will have parted and the sun will be shining again.

To spend less on new products or not spend to keep the product looking great would be foolish. If this is a recession, I want to come out of it looking better than anyone else.

Our two brands are resilient, and are well liked. I don't believe in loyalty in a downturn, but we have good support from a brilliant fan base.

I was instrumental in the purchase of Hotel du Vin. I had seen what the big boys had done to Malmaison and I ended up actually more protective of Hotel du Vin. There was one daft idea to rename it Petit Mal. We'd just spent £60m and probably £10m of that was for the brand, so why mess with it?

The hardest thing to say in life is no, but I say it more often now.

Our people strategy has been the cornerstone of how we've been able to develop. Last year, we opened five new hotels and 80 per cent of the management of those hotels came from within.

We haven't changed the DNA of the brands. I was very involved in the earliest days of Malmaison and it has stuck to its roots. I can design a Malmaison in my sleep.

If Malmaison is the Maserati, Hotel du Vin is the Morgan. Malmaison is all straight lines. It's cool—it's Prada. Hotel du Vin is more Liberty, Mulberry, shabby chic.

Hotel du Vin is quintessentially a British brand. It oozes Britain. Malmaison is international, and we have international intentions. It is a more dynamic, glamorous brand. Hotel du Vin is still a bit of a country cousin.

Strip away the brands and the two are run the same way. The thing we are about is hospitality. We are purveyors of a good night's sleep with great food and great beverage. That's what we do all the time.

It's not very serene behind the scenes of Malmaison or Hotel du Vin. The swan's legs are paddling like hell. But that's about being a small business. We haven't got the luxury of big infrastructure. 

I was destined to be a hotelier. My father was a hotelier and when I went to hotel school, I'd done five years of working in my dad's pubs and hotels.

Could I be anything else? No, I couldn't. If the government were to close all hotels tomorrow, I'd be really stuck.

But if I wasn't doing this—which is the best job in the hotel industry, bar none—I'd love to sort out British Airways. It would be a bloody big job, but I think I could do it. Or I'd like to run Newcastle United Football Club.