Have just finished watching the first of the new series of BBC’s Dragon’s Den in the hope of catching Ed Wray one of our success stories. He mentioned his BarbeSkew product was going to be appearing in the series but wasn’t allowed to say whether he got backing from the Dragons.
In this evening’s episode I was surprised by Peter Jones investing £75,000 in rock group Hamfatter with an unproven track record of sales, in exchange for 30% of their future royalties. Note – their website was down this evening due to too many visitors.
Since the last series I have begun giving business advice sessions myself, and I have to say that I am not a fan of the way the program turns entrepreneurship into entertainment. In particular I find the flippant comments from the Dragons to the enterprising inventors and business people annoying.
However, despite these criticisms, the questions they ask are often valid, as are many of their observations.
But Peter Jones came out with the quote of the show when referring to a product with a small potential market. He said there was a niche in the market, but no market in the niche.
Sadly I have come across several business ideas that fall into this category.