Thanks once again for the positive feedback, as you point out I believe the best reason to appear on Dragon’s Den is the publicity, i.e. Lings Cars.

Although you and I clearly see it for what it has become, the reality is that most people (including the “business” press sadly) believe it is the reality of business and raising finance.

Once again a very succinct Post on the business case, and I personally think Trunki is a fab idea, but once again all these Press articles and subsequent web comment/discussions completely miss the point.

Series 1 of Dragons’ Den (filmed back in 2003) had the feel of a real business investment show. None of the original Dragons knew that it would become cult (and therefore that they would become famous), and I would say pretty much all of the original contestants were genuinely there to raise seed funding.

After Series 1 had aired and we started filming series 2 all that changed. Suddenly the now ‘celebrity entrepreneur’ Dragons were super groomed with teeth which had been cosmetically whitened, sitting there trying to think of ‘one line’ put downs (a la Simon Cowell) that would guarantee them more chunks of the airtime (100 hours are filmed to make c5 hours of telly so there is big competition among the Dragons for the biggest slice of the final edit, and you don’t get airtime for making bland polite statements); while most of the contestants were blatantly there for a free BBC primetime ad (as I recall you yourself pointed out in a previous blog).

Thus Dragons’ Den no longer really merits discussion as a serious business investment show -because the premise is now so much more about PR & TV entertainment & egos, than it is about serious angel funding.

But, hey, it does make great TV – and in terms of the BBC’s own ‘return on investment’ they have done phenomenally well out of their joint venture with Sony – selling the 5 series to date to TV networks worldwide, as well as licensing the programme concept to various other production companies.

Not to mention spin off books #1 and #2 (due out this Autumn), plus the soon-to-be-released DVDs coming out on the Odeon Entertainment label (I received an email on this just last week for my input on the accompanying biographies – no fee for any of the Dragons’ participation of course!!!).

So when series 6 comes out, let’s all settle down with our popcorn and enjoy it for what it is – a modern day Coliseum, created for our entertainment. And not anything that should really be taken seriously by the real business world.