60 years old | Jukka Kurttila had a good career in his fifties, but then he changed fields

Jukka Kurttila there's something for everyone in their fifties: there's still plenty of time to make a career move and start something that can be called a life's work!

Kurttila, who turns 60 on Thursday, switched from a successful, more than 20-year career in the advertising world to the textile industry ten years ago.

“And now I think I've done my life's work at Finlayson.”

In 2014, Kurttila bought Petri Pesonen and Risto Voutilainen with the textile company Finlayson, and nowadays Makia, Reino & Ainoa and Vallila are run under the Manna Group brand house. In addition, Lexington is included, the acquisition of which with its debts drove Manna's figures into the red so that the company applied for corporate restructuring.

According to Kurttila, the company restructuring has been an “incredibly good thing” for Manna and many “numbers that were in red have been turned into green”.

“The special difficulty of the textile industry is its global nature and enormous speed in spreading fashion and trends. But I don't consider it any more difficult than any other industry.”

DIRECT a speech from Kurttila – followed by stories about how bold moves have paid off. From the years of advertising, for example, the “mortgage loan decision in an hour” campaign launched for Sampo bank, which at the time revolutionized the loan market, stands out. Kurttila and the partners had proposed promising a loan decision within one day, but the manager Mika Ihamuotila tightened the pace to one hour. The campaign differed from the usual advertisements for mortgages, in which banks seem to be dreaming together with their customers.

“But people don't want to dream with a bank. They dream with their spouse and family. All we want from the bank is a quick decision on whether or not to get it and under what conditions,” says Kurttila.

Finlayson, on the other hand, sold two different duvet covers side by side to demonstrate the price level of responsible production. In the 55-euro sheet, both the raw material certificates and the production auditors were known, according to Kurttila, “almost everything”. Nothing was known about the 15 euro product. The majority of customers chose the cheap product.

ResponsibilityKurttila has been thinking a lot about the word lately, because she is currently writing a book about it as a journalist Jose Riikonen with.

“The starting point of the book is mercy, but it emphasizes the importance of individual choices: how to get people to care about things,” explains Kurttil
a.

“Actually, the word responsibility makes me fat, it's related to processes and tight-fisted snooping. It's about learning to care.”

According to Jukka Kurttila, “exceptional fearlessness” is one of his merits. Picture: Pasi Kostiainen

MEDIATION Kurttila herself already learned during her childhood and teenage years in Kontula and Myllypuro in Helsinki. From the window of the working-class home, he could see the apartment building opposite where he lived Minna. His Kurttila says that he represents permanence in his life, because jobs and industries have changed, but his wife has not. It's been 40 years of marriage.

Kurttila studied geography at the University of Helsinki. I dreamed of a job as a teacher, but the academic world took me away. Already in the final stages of his studies, he worked as an assistant at the Department of Geography and from there transferred to the University of Technology as a researcher. But when Taloustutkimus attracted me to work on the commercial side, Kurttila was ready to change.

“There were a few things in the scientific world that bothered me. I was already an extrovert then. However, there were quite a few people working at the factories, and if I didn't get along with one guy, it meant that I didn't get along with a third of the employees,” he says.

“And the other thing that bothered me was that I came up with a lot of things. But when I still didn't get the name of the research suit, it hurt. And then when the ideas weren't even paid for. It didn't matter if you came up with zero or a hundred ideas!”

Jukka Kurttila is in no hurry to retire. Picture: Pasi Kostiainen

Kurttila's ideas have since found payers. He defines his merits as “extraordinary fearlessness” and “conceptual creative thinking”. For him, they are gifts that he intends to enjoy working with for a long time to come, even at work. There is no rush to retire, even if there is no longer any financial compulsion to work.

“The wife has said that it annoys her when I go to work every day in such a good mood. And it's true. It never hurts to go to work. And I never wake up for work. If I wake up at night, I do think about work, but that waking up is caused by heartburn, which in turn is caused by champagne or something else – never work.”

The death of Petri Pesonen last July was a shock for Kurttila, but it did not make her think about her own mortality.

“I do mourn Petri. I even have dreams about him.”

• Born 1964 in Helsinki.

• Master of Philosophy, University of Helsinki.

• Worked as a researcher at the University of Technology
  in the Department of Social Studies and as Research Director of Economic Studies.

• Founders of advertising agency Bob Helsinki (later Bob the Robot).

• One of the owners of Finlayson. Works at Manna Group as business director responsible for Finlayson and Vallila.

• One of the owners of the Kontula brewery.

• Chairman of the Board of Helsinki Children's Hospital.

• Lives in Helsinki and Salo. The family includes his wife Minna Kurttila, two adult children and two grandchildren, and rescue dog Sofia.

• Enjoys hunting.

• Turns 60 on Thursday January 11th.

What would you tell your 20-year-old self?

“Hold on.”