This weeks pitches on Dragons’ Den were:
- Fit-Fur-Life - A treadmill for our furry friends. She was looking for £100K in return for 25% equity. It’s aimed at vets, police and animal trainers for recuperation, although much as I hate to say it I can see a cheaper version selling to lazy people for their pet dogs and making a lot of money. James Caan offered the 100K in return for 50% equity which was accepted.
- Malagasy - Ethical fine food from Madagascar. This was a short pitch so we didn’t get much detail about his business opportunity, but we did find out that it was loosing money, which lost the Dragons’ interest.
- Hydrodome - Underwater experiences in a mini sub being chased by a robotic shark. A somewhat unique business idea, which the Dragons nor I quite understood. He’s got some excellent products and excellent credentials so why not market and sell the products, why bother with a capital intensive investment in the Hydrodome when he could be churning out profitable products.
- Mini-Cat - A mini inflatable Catamaran. Again another short pitch as as he’s only sold 2 in twelve months there was no interest.
- Toy Stuffing - Again a short pitch for a toy stuffing machine/franchise.
- The Car Club - Nice effort getting a racing car into the studio, but a short pitch so we didn’t really get to hear what the business opportunity was.
- HandyGirl - A girl with powertools. She was clearly passionate but I don’t think she had a business model to franchise, the dragons didn’t either. Insulting men and tradesmen and then admitting to not having any qualifications caused some upset and hurt her credibility.
- The return of Mr Q-Top, this time asking for £60K for a solar cell strap, no dragons were interested in his invention but Peter Jones again offered him a job, this time saying it’d pay £60K.
- JPM Eco Logistics - A bio-diesel powered haulage company. With 98% recycled trucks (I’d love to know which 2% isn’t recycled). Obvious a very relevant business idea given the current emphasis on green business and sustainability. They ended up with four dragons willing to invest, James Caan and Duncan Bannatyne offering £100K for 45% between them and Deborah Meaden and Theo Paphitis offering the £100K for 40% which was accepted. They came across as two decent chaps and for once the entrepreneurs had clearly researched the Dragons and decided who they wanted on board. I see this one going places.
What did you think of them?
This blog is about business opportunities and ideas that I spot, think of or hear about and think are useful and interesting. It is intended to provide ideas and inspriation for you to help you find the right business idea for you to then grow it into a successful business.
Mr Q Top is a poster over on PeterJones’s forum and he says he did not accept Peter’s £60k job offer - would still prefer to go it alone which I think many entrepreneurs understand - how easy would you find working as an employee after self-employment.
The hydrodome - I also can not understand the building of a purpose built pool. Sell the underwater sub and robots as products and also rent out existing pools around the country for ’shark days’ - this means there would not be the capital expense, less risk if the venture turns out not to attract as many interested people and also it can be taken all around the country rather than a single static site.
Eco Logistics? Whatever! The likes of Scania and Volvo etc build the vehicles with the required Euro 4 and 5 emissions, everybody uses them, this is nothing new. All new trucks are the same! Putting the word ‘Eco’ in front of another word does not make it so. In road transport the same costs are still involved, both environmental and financial. But, if you can pull the wool over the eyes of the yoghurt knitters and tree dwelleres and get help in running a bog-standard haulage company? Well done!
Eco Johnson BSc (Hons) Transport & Logistics
Julian - quite I would struggle to work for someone else again.
Eddie - I think the eco edge was supposed to come from bio-diesel. I’m not sure if/how many other haulage companies use it.
I wonder if any of the dragons approached the submarine guy after to discuss investing in just the sub? The Handy Girl one seemed very similar to those two women last year offering female builders. They might as well just have shown the replies to that.
Phil, true but fortunately she wasn’t quite as abrasive as those two.