Born on 9 September 1890, in Henryville, Indiana, United States, Colonel Harland Sanders was destined to give the world one of the tastiest chicken recipes. As easy as it seems, the 11 herbs are still guarded under tight security to maintain the secrecy of Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC).
Colonel Sanders is not only renowned for his finger-lickin’ good chicken but also for his numerous failures and setbacks that dawned his sun that would never set until people consumed chicken.
When Sanders was merely 5 years old, his father passed away, leaving his mother and three children behind. This loss helped Sanders to write his glorious future and he blossomed in adversity like a lotus.
No hours, nor amount of labor, nor amount of money would deter me from giving the best that there was in me.
When his mother would go to work on the day end, he would take care of his siblings and this made him proficient in cooking. At the age of just 7, Colonel learnt how to make bread and vegetables and developed his knowledge in preparing good-cooked meat. By the age of 10, Sanders was working a farm, creating a path for this future.
The life changed for him at the age of 12 when his mother remarried in 1902. The arduous environment at the home post the marriage forced him to leave the home the following year for good.
I’ve only had two rules: Do all you can and do it the best you can. It’s the only way you ever get that feeling of accomplishing something.
For the next few years, he worked many odd jobs, including owning a ferry boar and selling tyres, thus never sticking to anything particular. At the age of 40, in 1930, Sanders finally opened up a restaurant inside a Shell Oil Company-owned gas station in North Corbin Kentucky, where he sold chicken.
Finally, he got a breakeven point in 1939, when he owned a motel and a restaurant, but lost them to fire just 4 months after the inauguration. In 1940, at the age of 50, Colonel started discovering his secret recipe that would change the taste of chicken and people would not look at it anywhere, other than his.
World War II then brought him near bankruptcy when he sold his business in 1942 and also got divorced in 1947.
He again started a restaurant and was going good, when an interstate route that led traffic past his place was changed. Feeling dejected by the fortune, Sanders didn’t call it quits. He decided to sell his franchised chicken model to restaurants and would take only 4 cents commissions per chicken burger sold. He was rejected by 1009 restaurants before sealing a deal.
Soon after the company became too big for Sanders to handle, so in 1964, he sold off his company to a group of investors led by John Y. Brown, Jr. and Jack C. Massey.
His image is widely used in KFC advertising, making him an immortal figure in the fast-food industry.
You got to like your work. You have got to like what you are doing, you have got to be doing something worthwhile so you can like it – because it is worthwhile, that it makes a difference, don’t you see?
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