Dragons den – into the fire?

“You are scheduled to come in for filming for Dragons Den during the first week in January”

Our call to arms that made the Dragons Den application suddenly very real. We were lucky though. We found out in early November so we had time to prepare.

But where to start?

Well the first thing we did was sit back and look at previous contestants on other shows. What did they do well? What did they do that didn’t help their case? We tried to get all we could out of the clips.

So then what?

We prepped the pitch. We prepped it again. We delivered it to nice people who told us to go away and prep it again. We pitched to a trial panel supported by the most excellent Wicklow CEB who told us to go away and work on it again. They all said the same thing. “It’s a bit boring, but you get into it once the conversation opens up.”

We worked on the pitch some more. How could we make a project management product sexy for business in our pitch? It’s not a tangible thing. We couldn’t give the Dragons something to eat, smell or touch. It was going to have to be how we pitched ourselves more than the product itself.

We worked on the wording, we ran over it again and again and again….

The day of filming arrived. It was the week of the big snow – typical. So we set off about two hours early in case we got stuck. We didn’t so arrived in plenty of time to regret not having a proper brekkie!

The time between arrival and filming was a blur of make-up, rehearsing ourselves again and blind panic – could we make a run for it?

“Barney and Eoin, you are up next.” Damnit – too late!

Then we were walking up the stairs and into the room with the Dragons. Surreal does not even begin to sum it up – it looks like it does on the telly. This probably sounds a bit odd, but we were expecting it to be different somehow in terms of “feel”.

The Dragons all looked very serious but welcoming. They became the focus and in fairness to the production team, the TV element drifted into the background. It was us and the Dragons, nothing more, nothing less. Some things went well, some not so much. Nerves got in the way a bit, but this eased up as we went along.

Then we were heading back down the stairs again. The Dragons are a shrewd bunch. Their questions and comments were fair – I say this having had time to reflect. On the day we were bulling with some of them!

No cash was forthcoming but we were now much more aware of what we needed to focus on and the direction we needed to take.

Waiting to see how it turned out was pretty stressful. We had created some classic telly moments, but we were happy with what was shown. Even Bobby commenting that we’d kill each other came across as a fair point. He’s right, we would! Of course, the best comment was from Sean at the end and this made it worthwhile.

We’re glad we did it. It was quite an experience. What do you mean you havn’t seen it?