Practice the perfect way to tame the Dragons, says pump inventor

Simeon Goldstein, packagingnews.co.uk, 28 August 2009

 

Dragons' Den victor Michael Pritchard has revealed getting friends to role-play the Dragons was key to his walking away with a £125,000 investment, in an exclusive interview with Packaging News.

 

Pritchard secured the money from investors Theo Paphitis and Peter Jones in return for just a 20% stake in the Anyway pump spray, which works at any angle, on Wednesday's show.

 

He said it was a great experience and that, despite his pitch being much longer than the footage that appeared on TV, he felt it had "gone very quickly".

 

Pritchard added he had done a lot of preparation for the show, including persuading five friends to act as Dragons, allowing him to think about the kind of information they would be looking for.

 

"I think too many people don't give the Dragons enough respect. If I had not shown them respect by preparing, they would have torn me to pieces," he said.

 

He said had he was confident on getting the patents for the Anyway, despite it proving a sticking point for some of the Dragons. "They ask genuine questions as they need to understand about things like that."

 

Anyway is a dip tube with millions of tiny holes that allows a constant spray to be maintained if any part of the tube is in contact with any of the liquid in the pack. This ensures that the spray does not need to be held upright in order to work.

 

The response to the product had been impressive, said Pritchard. Since filming the show in July there had been "some very good feedback" from one of the largest trigger manufacturers. "The morning after the show went out, we had a call from a valve manufacturer. Hopefully, we're getting the message out there," he said.

 

"It was a good experience for me. I'm proud of it and delighted Peter and Theo are on board. I got the impression they knew it was a good investment," he added.