It probably speaks volumes about the type of person she is, but Anne Norman doesn't mind admitting she hates the board game Monopoly. "It's so boring," she grumbles.
The man she has just hired as the new managing director for her family's latest business venture begs to differ. "Every household should have Monopoly," he argues. "It's my favourite game."
Ian Draper is clearly one of those competitive players who gets a little too enthusiastic when it's time to collect the rent for Park Lane. But Mrs Norman can't resist teasing him a little more.
It was largely because of Mr Draper's powers of persuasion she and her husband David ended up buying Whitcoulls, she suggests.
"Someone gave us Ian's name and we thought there might be an opportunity for him in our own firm. But honestly, when he came all he would talk about was jolly Whitcoulls, and we figured the only way to shut this guy up was to buy the damn thing!"
She is, of course, not being entirely serious.
Yet the Normans are clearly very serious about the future of Whitcoulls, and so is Mr Draper - so serious that, for the second time in two years, they even consent to chatting to the Herald. But they absolutely refuse to allow any more photos to be taken.
"How many photos do you have of Graeme Hart?" Mr Draper retorts.
He has a point. For several decades, the Normans have remained almost as mysterious - perhaps even more so - as New Zealand's richest man, all the while steadily building a retail empire that, while not quite up there with Rank Group, is almost certainly one of New Zealand's biggest businesses, and biggest employers.
But unlike Mr Hart, the Normans prefer to hold on to their assets, possibly forever. "If David was here, he'd say we've never sold a business," Mrs Norman says.
As it happens, volcanic ash has kept Mr Norman in Australia on the day we agree to meet, in a nondescript boardroom in a nondescript building on the outskirts of Auckland's CBD. But his absence is not really that unusual, given he spends around half his time in Australia anyway, running the Australian arm of James Pascoe Ltd.
According to Australian company records, that subsidiary alone - which includes the jewellery chains Prouds, Goldmark and Angus and Coote - recorded revenue of more than $750 million last year. Add to that the revenue from Pascoes and Stewart Dawsons in New Zealand, plus homeware chain Stevens and department store Farmers, and we're talking about nearly 10,000 employees, and revenue getting close to $2 billion.
The Whitcoulls purchase, which was finally confirmed on June 21, has added an extra 900 or so people to the payroll, and around $150 million or so to turnover.
It doesn't seem to have sunk in for the public yet, but this very private company is larger than the Warehouse, and at least four times as big as Michael Hill International.
Group finance manager Kevin Turner, who is also present, is coy about the details. But he is happy to join in the joshing.
"Why do you do it? Because you enjoy it, Anne," he prompts at one point.
"That's right. You see opportunities like Whitcoulls and how can you not do it?" she agrees. "How can you not take up that opportunity?"
Actually, plenty of people seemed quite happy to give that opportunity a miss, and the Normans are well aware there are some observers who are convinced they are throwing a considerable chunk of their considerable fortune down a slowly leaking drain.
Over the past year, stories of turmoil in the international book trade, and the threats it faces from globalisation and new technology, have raised the spectre of the similar anguish the music industry has already gone through.
While the take-up of e-books in New Zealand remains unknown, given no-one knows exactly how many e-readers or e-books companies such as Amazon are selling Downunder, it is generally accepted that it is probably still very small. But that isn't the case overseas.
It was reported this week the average British shopper spends 4 ($NZ7.76) per month on e-books. For Random House USA, e-books already make up a third of its sales.
Borders, once hailed as a haven for book lovers, is enduring a slow and painful death, and Barnes and Noble is battling hard to stay alive. Across the Tasman, not a single potential buyer has yet emerged for Whitcoulls' sister company, book chain Angus and Robertson.
Whitcoulls can trace its roots to a bookstore founded in 1882 in Christchurch's Cashel St, and has been rated as one of the best-known brands in New Zealand.
Yet it is widely believed the Normans, and possibly PaperPlus, were the only potential buyers to show any serious interest in the chain. And it has already been revealed they do not intend to keep the Borders brand going in this country.
But the nay-sayers were similarly pessimistic about the future of Farmers when the Normans bought that retail business for $122 million in 2003 - and look at it now, Mr Draper notes.
"I think it's a great story that Whitcoulls is back in New Zealand hands," he enthuses.
"It's also sitting in a group that has a history of turning businesses around. Farmers is another business that was Australian-owned for a long period of time, and that's had a huge turnaround in the past few years."
Mr Draper is a Briton who came to New Zealand as a tourist in the mid-'90s and loved it so much he decided to stay. He had previously worked for supermarket giant Safeway, and in 1995 he landed a job in merchandising for Whitcoulls. By the time he left 13 years later, he had worked under seven different owners and had become its managing director.
In February 2007, Mr Draper sang the praises of Whitcoulls' then-owners, Australia's Pacific Equity Partners (PEP), in an article in these very pages about the private equity boom. But 18 months later he resigned, shortly after PEP announced it had agreed to pay more than $100 million for 32 Borders stores in New Zealand, Australia and Singapore.
He is reluctant to talk about the past, and is clearly keen to get the business back on track as fast as possible, and certainly in time for the all-important Christmas rush.
By the time you read this, the windows of its flagship store in Auckland's Queen St may well have been cleaned - given Anne Norman made it clear she couldn't stand the grime much longer. But planning is also under way for much more fundamental changes.
Mr Draper confirms the Borders store on Queen St will continue to operate until its lease runs out next year, and will then be abandoned. The Borders at Riccarton in Christchurch will also be closed. But all existing staff will be offered jobs elsewhere in the group.
The other three Borders stores in Wellington and Auckland will be converted to the Whitcoulls brand. In Wellington, that means the Whitcoulls store on Lambton Quay may close. Despite rumours to the contrary, the Queen St store will remain a Whitcoulls, and the Normans do not plan to convert any Whitcoulls sites into Farmers stores.
In Christchurch, Whitcoulls stores in Riccarton and Bishopdale are also closing, and Cashel St and Colombo St have already been reduced to rubble. The Normans decided not to buy the Papamoa store from the administrators, or a store in the Albany MegaCentre.
However, Mr Draper is excited about the potential of the remaining Borders stores, which are huge - particularly the one at Sylvia Park in Auckland. It is an ideal chance to keep the best of what Borders had to offer - basically a huge range of books and magazines - and ditch the things didn't work, like music and silly knick-knacks.
Cafes will remain where they can be accommodated, and DVDs and gift items will continue to feature. And some categories will be greatly expanded, such as greeting cards, and its range of games and educational toys (hence the banter about Monopoly).
Mr Draper proudly notes a quarter of New Zealand's households are members of Whitcoulls' loyalty scheme, and he confirms its popular marketing tools such as the Whitcoulls Top 100, Guaranteed Great Reads, and Staff Picks will continue. He is also keen to see a renewed emphasis on fiction, and on books for children.
"There are certain things that Whitcoulls has always done incredibly well that we want to be back and famous for, particularly fiction," he says. "We see fiction not just as hardback and paperback, but also e-book."
Whitcoulls will embrace the e-book, he confirms.
Anne Norman would hate people to think she doesn't understand the challenges the industry is facing.
"We haven't gone into this with blinkers on about e-books," she stresses. "We are well aware of where they are going and what's needed to be done." But on the other hand, both are keen to point out books make up just 30% of Whitcoulls' sales.
"The e-reader is important, but it's not the whole future," Mrs Norman insists. "You're still going to need a stapler and paper clips, too."
Mr Draper is the first to admit the stores desperately need a makeover, and a new computer system. The old one, he notes, was installed in 1999.
"The only thing I would say is that in the last three years there has been very little investment in the fit-outs and you can see that," he says. "They're quite tired and that's something we need to address as new owners."
In August, he and Mrs Norman plan to take a look at international best practice in book and stationery sales. A much-improved, touch-screen Kobo e-reader will be on sale before Christmas, and many of its 60 or so stores will eventually feature the dedicated displays of e-books and e-readers that are already popping up overseas. But again, they are both keen to stress books are only part of the Whitcoulls story.
"What Whitcoulls has always been very good at is personal stationery, particularly the design and fashion type of stuff," Mr Draper says. "It's very much at the moment about clearing out the old stock, and getting the new ranges in. There are New Zealand suppliers at the moment who are just thrilled that we are back looking at all the New Zealand products."
Mr Turner notes James Pascoe knows its customers so well, because they are so familiar.
"The same customer that shops at Farmers also shops at Whitcoulls, and Pascoes," he explains. "It's the same customer for all three brands."
That said, while the new owners are keen to see Whitcoulls get back to growth, they scotch any suggestion the chain might eventually expand into Australia.
Mr Turner describes the Normans as "very hands-on" owners, and at this stage they've got more than enough on their plate, he suggests.
Mrs Norman agrees: "There are just so many people with so many suggestions. We've got the funds to do it, but it's also a matter of the man hours."
