The Most Conflicting Pitch in Dragons' Den History | Dragons' Den

next to face the dragons are proud parents lauren and mark taylor everything that we're doing with the business is all about doing it for our own children they're at the heart of everything we do and it's their skin care product for the booming baby care market that they're here to pitch we get people telling us we've changed their lives it feels more than a business to us it feels like a passion but will the dragon show equal passion for an investment hello dragons i'm lauren and this is my husband mark and we're here today to offer you 10 of our business cacoso skin limited in exchange for a 50 000 pound investment our product is cacoso baby the premium quality 100 natural and organic coconut oil specially selected for head to toe infant skin care kokoso baby was born out of a desire to care for our daughter's skin in the most natural way possible as a new mum i was one of the 89 percent of parents worried about the potentially harmful chemicals in mainstream baby toiletries so i did my research and discovered the many topical benefits of raw virgin coconut oil so when we started the business we made it our mission to source the highest grade coconut oil we could find we're currently selling on our website in independent baby boutiques and in boot stores throughout the uk there are 700 000 babies born in the uk alone every year and the trend in baby toiletries is moving towards premium natural and organic just like a coso baby thank you for your time would you like to try the product a well-oiled pitch from parents come business partners lauren and mark taylor a little goes a long way they're hoping 50 000 pounds of dragon investment for a 10 stake will propel their infant skin care range into a must-have product for baby news that they're already stocked in one high street retailer has caught the attention of nick jenkins lauren mark i'm nick hi nick um you're stocked in boots yeah tell me about some numbers we launched in 200 stores and they're doubling the number of stores to 400. okay 2400. and you sold how much have you sold in those 200 stores in the last 12 months in the last uh 12 months nine thousand was since we launched into nine thousand nine thousand units units so what's that in pounds that would be about about twenty thousand pounds i'm sort of hoping you're gonna say more than that [Music] how many stores are they got in total well they they only have a certain amount with baby sections okay how many they've got with baby sections uh there's about 800 800 seconds if you extrapolate that up and you say well wow imagine we can get into the biggest chemistry in the country and they've got 800 stores and with that that would just be amazing and transformational for the business but um if that turned into sort of 80 000 pounds of the business that that wouldn't be transformational really would it no [Music] your product has sold less than one of these per store per week genuinely that is not good well so what's gone wrong i mean they don't boots themselves don't see it that way we haven't really done it with any marketing so when the idea of having a retail store is that you put things in it that people hopefully will buy as i said just by just by offering a promotion for two weeks we doubled sales and they stayed at that level for the next four months but they're doubling the number of stalls we're in from next month and that's got to be well that means that you're going to be moving about 90 per store per year i guess if that yeah that average yeah yeah that's really bad [Music] not the best of starts for lauren and mark as they're forced to defend their moderate high street sales deborah meaden is a prime player in the organic market does she forecast a more profitable future [Music] i love the smell you know and the purity of it is really lovely because one of the things i constantly say is don't put things on your children's skin that you wouldn't put in their mouth because that's the thing you know our skin absorbs exactly the same things that we do when we eat you know and that you can't get purer than that unfortunately i feel very very conflicted because i've actually invested in a toiletries range we're looking to spread out to creams you know i i couldn't talk about this as you know the ultimate product and then talk about that as the ultimate you know the one that i'm already involved in yeah so i might as well say now you know sadly for those reasons um i i'm gonna have to declare myself out a previous den investment in a skin care range for children leaves a conflicted deborah meaden unable to do business and she's the first dragon out is mum of four sarah willingham more inclined to pursue a deal [Music] in terms of putting raw organic coconut oil on your kids i think it is completely the future the way forward it's been the single product that i've put on my kids eczema that's had the biggest success yeah but i also uh i have to come clean i'm also very conflicted because i have just invested in a raw organic coconut oil business that is extremely good quality it's not yet in skin care but it the actual product is exactly the same so i'm afraid i'm going to have to declare myself out as well can i tell you why my hand has been slightly slightly forced i have realized that i'm conflicted because i am actually a joint investor with um with sarah so it would be very odd of me to to make you an offer i'm afraid i can't invest so i'm out a further blow as sarah willingham and nick jenkins also find themselves hamstrung by a conflicting den investment which means high street retailer tucker suleiman has a chance to take advantage of the situation you've lost dragons because they're conflicted yeah yeah they're in a similar business so there must be something in it yeah right you've got a brand you're in boots one step ahead of the competition so you you've gone past that initial hurdle the real question is is is is this a business that can grow the way we see it is we've got the coconut oil as the hero product this is this is what does all the good all the other products that we can then bring into that to produce a range all revolve around this one hero product so it's really looking at the potential where we want to be and having a dragon to make sure that we can scale to that level um and be in the in the everyday baby market you're saying that you want to compete with the big boys yeah you realize once you're in that arena your margin gets squeezed you're not selling much you'll just get eaten alive tucker sullivan is worried that as the entrepreneur's business expands their profit margins will come under pressure can peter jones see a more favorable prospect for an investment this is quite sad isn't he got three people that are conflicted got you've got two still in um and would you believe it i think i'm conflicted because i own 30 percent of truly holly baby which is holly willoughby's company and we are bringing out a range of creams and everything's organic everything is natural so four out of five dragons are conflicted which is probably the first time i've ever known this to happen in the den i clearly am not going to go and invest in in in this when i'm out okay thank you when i look at your numbers and look at where you're at you've probably got hardly anything in the bank correct yeah what do you want from a dragon what doors you want open or is it just the money you want cause you're desperate for the money no no not at all we have a vision of where we can take it and what other products we can bring in that are more mainstream [Music] what would you expect from me just just an overview business strategy really just an overview of where we want to be and make sure we can get there from someone that's scaled a business and can see what pitfalls we might fall into make sure we don't fall into them it's a business there's not much there at the moment at the moment however i admire what you've done and um i'm thinking [Music] um as a brand i love it and i'm gonna make you an offer thank you i think you are going to need quite a bit of mentoring in the business world and probably help you out with your websites help you out to see where you want to go with this and i'm going to want a bit more percentage i'm afraid you know and and i'd want 30 of the business for fifty grand okay should we get another thing finally an offer but to casilliman's equity demand of 30 is three times the 10 that lauren and mark wanted to give away [Music] well we did say it's the entrepreneur's turn to be conflicted i would have gone for 40. hmm you're going to come back one second doesn't mean that's a lot of work at least a lot of work what about the option to go down i don't really want to go will they do a deal or walk away [Music] i think you put us in a slightly difficult position because we did say we wouldn't go above 25 have you got any any room to come down [Music] i won't come down but i'll i'll put it this way to you when i get my money back right yeah i'll give you back the five percent okay for free okay i've got a very good team behind me and we'll help you on a daily basis sounds amazing thank you we'd like to accept you thank you good fantastic great thanks very it takes a brave entrepreneur to negotiate with the last dragon standing thank you so much i'm excited about it thank you they've given away 30 of their business but with an agreement that tuka sullivan will give back five percent of the business when he recoups his initial investment ecstatic couldn't be happier they were sort of dropping like flies at one point congratulations tuka thank you i love the product i love the branding can only go one way you

Channel: Dragons' Den

Views: 763,552

Keywords: dragons den, dragons den uk, evan davis, deborah meaden, touker suleyman, tej lalvani, business pitching, entrepreneur, game show, reality tv, shark tank, seaweed, mara seaweed, bbc iplayer, peter jones, jenny campbell, the den, invenstment, business, opportunity, biggest, best, worst, top 10, money, millionaire, billionaire, new, series, funny, funniest, toughest, beer, alcohol, negotiation, coconut oil, coconut oil for skin, best baby skincare products 2021, conflicting dragons den

Id: 2mutSlXDMWA

Length: 13min 26sec (806 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 29 2021