A Dragons’ Den contestant who was rejected by all six investors has revealed she’s set to be making £10,000,000 in just a few months.
Lucie MacLeod entered the BBC One competition with the hope of scoring a £190,000 investment for a 3% stake in her hair oils business Hair Syrup.
She was looking to secure at least one Dragon, pitching to the likes of Peter Jones, Deborah Meaden, Touker Suleyman, Sara Davies, Steven Bartlett and guest Dragon and beauty guru Trinny Woodall.
After receiving an ‘uncomfortable’ offer that was later withdrawn by Touker, Lucie, 24, walked away empty-handed.
But she’s now had the last laugh, and is about to make eight-figures.
Lucie began Hair Syrup after damaging her own hair as a teenager, and turning to natural ingredients in her mum’s kitchen like egg yolk and mashed avocado for help.
After concocting her own natural remedies and a TikTok video going viral overnight, she began sending her products to friends before it turned into a viable commercial venture.
Studying English literature at Warwick university at the time before moving home aged 20 when the nation went into lockdown, Lucie had a hope of selling just ten bottles.
Little did she know that she’d go on to sell a million and her life would drastically change.
When she pitched to the Dragons in the Den last year, she valued Hair Syrup at £6,500,000 with a turnover in 2024 of £4,500,000.
‘It’s worth a lot more now,’ she teased in an interview with Metro, months after the episode initially aired.
Lucie confirmed that she’s now set to make £10,000,000 by 2026, despite facing six rejections in the Den.
Her segment on the programme caused quite a stir with viewers, after she was grilled over her numbers and left with the Dragons bickering between themselves over Touker’s offer.
‘It was a pretty unique experience,’ she admitted, saying she went in with no idea of what to expect and describing her experience as overwhelming and intense.
‘I went in their completely blind, basically, and I don’t think I really expected what it was like being in there.’
She added: ‘It was really terrifying, I’m pretty confident and don’t really get stage fright, but I was really, really scared, shaking when I got on that stage.’
Lucie decided to take her company to the Den after being approached by the casting team, and deciding that it wasn’t an opportunity she could turn down.
She knew she wasn’t necessarily in need of investment, but wanted mentorship and the chance to work with the Dragons, with her eye on Peterin particular.
And though Lucie walked away without any offers, she was branded ‘a success story’ by the investor she’d sought.
Originally, she had planned to enter the Den offering just 1%, because the company at the time was already worth more than £6,500,000.
She decided to up her offer in the hope two Dragons would join forces for 1.5% each, having seen previous pitches where they claimed they ‘wouldn’t even get out of bed’ for anything less.
Nonetheless, Lucie still walked out without any offers, admitting: ‘I really think there’s no way to play the game in there.
‘You don’t know how the conversation is going to go, or what they’re going to think of you… it’s really difficult to prepare for.’
‘When an offer started getting put on the table then retracted, things started getting messy,’ she continued, remembering the difficult interaction she faced at the end of her pitch when Touker said: ‘I don’t want you to feel like I’ve tricked you in anyway, that is not my intention.
‘I’ll tell you what Lucie, I can feel you’re uncomfortable and I don’t want to take away 3% for nothing from your business so I’m out.’
‘By this point, my adrenaline had gone and I was absolutely exhausted,’ Lucie remembered.
After three hours in the Den talking about herself and the business, she felt like her head was fried, adding: ‘I’ve never been in a position like this in my life.’
‘I just felt like I was doing something wrong and like I’d caused a big argument between everyone.’
Lucie also confirmed that when Touker made his offer – which left both Steven and Deborah openly in disbelief and Peter saying the ‘honourable’ thing would be for Touker to rescind it – it was interpreted by viewers as worse than it really was.
‘Within the context of the conversation it wasn’t that bad of an offer,’ she revealed.
‘I wanted mentorship and for someone to help me, it wasn’t that I needed the cash, so it wasn’t as bad as it seemed.
‘And to be honest, that first no you get makes you really desperate in a sense.’
However, looking back, she has no regrets and now thinks it would have been a mistake to accept Touker’s offer.
And her company is continuing to thrive without it, with Lucie still set to fulfil her future entrepreneurship plans with other businesses, such as revision books.
Since her time on the show, Hair Syrup has faced a 66% increase in sales, which was sustained for eight weeks after the episode aired.
She’s also been featured in national news and nominated for awards.
The founder revealed words of wisdom given to her by Steven after Dragons’ Den, where he predicted how much her life would change.
She said: ‘He was like, “Lucie, your life is going to change now, you’re going to be a star and your name is going to be out there. Yeah, your brand will grown and you’ll make some sales off it, but this for you as an entrepreneur will change your life and put you on the map.”
‘And I was like, what are you on about? I never thought in a million years that going on Dragons’ Den would make me a hot topic.
‘I thought it would just be Hair Syrup, but he was totally right, that is what has happened.
‘It completely transformed my life, turning me from this nobody really who has a brand, and I was just the person who owned it, and it’s evened out now and I’ve become just as relevant in the entrepreneurial space as the brand.’
She continued: ‘Steven said this would be the best thing that’s ever happened to me, that this rejection is the start of my career, and I just didn’t believe him.’
Dragons’ Den is available to watch on BBC iPlayer.
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