Dragon’s Den Turned Down Man’s Business That Is Now Worth £86 Million

When Harry and Charlie Thuillier went on hit BBC show Dragon's Den they were excited to see where their product could take them.

The duo stood in front of the dragons and asked for £60,000 in exchange for seven percent of the business but after being told that the low calorie ice cream treat was 'about as useful as mudguards on a tortoise', they left.

The business, OPPO Brothers, has since increased in value over 100 times with investment from 959 people - including Andy Murray.

"Peter Jones even told us healthier ice cream was about as useful as mudguards on a tortoise. We struggled not to laugh.

"Even though we had other investment, we would have liked an offer of course. 

"In many ways the Dragons were right, selling to supermarkets is very difficult and would have been a very risky investment for them - but they just couldn't see we had the kind of resilience to ride the rollercoaster."

After the segment from the BBC show aired, OPPO was trending on Google UK and and shops sold out.

That's when Touker Suleyman even approached them trying to get in on the action but Charlie went on to say: "Touker’s team were in touch a couple of times in 2017/18 but we didn’t meet with them as we weren’t in a position to accept investment at that time.

"But we did receive investment from Andy Murray, as well as 958 other investors. The majority of those sold their shares in 2019 for 6.4 times their original investment."

Charlie and Harry, 35, started the business in 2014 after spending two years testing out healthy alternatives in the kitchen until finally finding something that tasted just as good as the calorific ice cream many of us know (and love).

Now they've gone on to win four Great Taste Awards, have their product sold in major supermarkets such as Sainsburys, Tesco and Waitrose as well as trying to 'do good' by supporting different initiatives.