A Dragons’ Den contestant who will appear on tonight’s episode of the long-running BBC show has revealed a glimpse behind the scenes of the feared and revered board room.
Will Little, the 40-year-old owner of Little’s Coffee, applied to feature in the show on a whim – and never expected to hear back from producers at all.
So when he was invited up to Manchester for filming, his only aim was not to faint in front of the business titans while pitching his family-run, second generation coffee company.
Will took over the Devon-based business from his parents after they moved to Spain to enjoy a sun-soaked retirement. Since then, he has taken the business from strength to strength with his Nespresso-compatible pods and instant coffee available in supermarkets across the UK.
But after walking into the Den, he realised he was ‘grossly unprepared’ for the process that lay ahead – and was equally surprised by secrets of the set he only discovered once he was there.
‘I had thought “it would be nice wouldn’t it”,’ he said.
‘But I genuinely hadn’t indulged in that thought and when I went in to the Den I was grossly unprepared for the whole offering bit.
‘So when Deborah (Meaden) first said “right, I’m going to make you an offer” I nearly just fell down.
When Will Little, 40, owner of Little’s coffee, got the call that he would be appearing on BBC ‘s long-running business reality show he was in shock – but not for the reasons you would expect
‘I just had a good time in the end even though it was absolutely terrifying.’
Walking in to the studio, Will thought he knew what to expect having watched the show countless times but was surprised to find the industrial warehouse was in fact a sound stage and the Dragons nothing like their on-screen personas.
Will told FEMAIL in an exclusive interview that he was surprised to find the Dragons were much friendlier than he had expected and added it was a joy to work with them.
The father-of-two said: ‘One of the most interesting things about it for was I had been warned to watch out but that also they’re all just playing characters for the TV show.
‘They’ve each got their own characters so I went in their thinking I just had to go with it.
‘But they all treated me well and were really complimentary and yes, they gave me a grilling but they were very, very complimentary and it was odd.’
He added that, like viewers at home, he had a preconception of how the dynamic would be but found it couldn’t have been further from the truth.
Walking in to the studio, Will thought he knew what to expect having watched the show countless times but was surprised to find the industrial warehouse was in fact a sound stage and the Dragons nothing like their on-screen personas
Will told FEMAIL in an exclusive interview that he was surprised to find the Dragons were much friendlier than he had expected and added it was a joy to work with them
‘You’ve got preconceptions of how it’s probably going to go, because you’ve seen Deborah Meaden be quite cold or stern and you’ve seen Peter kind of of the same thing but in the end was just a chat,’ he said.
Will added that he really enjoyed meeting Deborah and felt a particular connection because of their shared link to Devon.
He said: ‘And Deborah was very personable because she was from our end, our neck of the woods and ran some businesses in Exeter and so we connected on that level.’
One thing that did surprise the entrepreneur was how helpful the Dragons were while he was pitching.
Will explained that while they might come across as silent and stony-faced on TV, the process was a lot less dramatic in person and each Dragon had their own way of giving him some encouragement.
‘Deborah would sit there bolt upright with her knees together and her palms on her knees but every now and then, if someone was giving me a hard time, she would tilt her head and smile and nod at me, just to say “it’s all alright, you’re doing well”‘, he revealed.
‘Steven Bartlett did a couple of winks and things like that and it’s those things that I don’t think ever make the edit.
‘It was a weird experience and it wasn’t what I was expecting at all, and I just thought they were all just really sweet, they’re really lovely.’
Will explained that while they might come across as silent and stoney-faced on TV, the process was a lot less dramatic in person and each Dragon had their own way of giving him some encouragement
Will also revealed that filming didn’t go as expected either and rather than walking around in an intimidating warehouse, he was instead ushered through a series of purpose-built sets.
He also revealed that the iconic lift where budding business owners walk out of at the start of their pitch is completely fake, telling MailOnline that its just a wooden wall.
‘There is no lift. It’s all filmed on one floor in a studio in Manchester and it’s all a stage,’ Will said.
‘You have wooden walls and staging, so it’s not a warehouse and it’s not a real lift and you do the filming in three parts.’
He explained that the camera crew will film the introductory bits where candidates introduce themselves and that might take several goes, but the pitch is live and in real time.
The Little’s owner said: ‘The first part is an interview before the entrepreneur goes in to the Den and then they’ll have some footage of the entrepreneur in the hallway with the portraits of the Dragons.
‘Then they take you over to what they call the antechamber, which is another studio maybe 20 metres away where a producer films the introduction where you go “Hi! I’m Will Little and I do this, that, and the other from Devon,” and then the final thing is obviously to go in to the Den which is live.
‘You only get one shot at that, there’s no re-framing – it’s one and done.’
Although he did add that if something were to go terribly wrong, you could ask for a second go but that was rare.
The producers tell you that if you really need to stop and something gone terribly wrong, you can put your hand up and say “I’d like filming to stop”, he explained.
‘But that would be if things had gone very, very sideways.
‘There’s no direction or director, there’s no calling action. The lift doors open and that’s it, you’re there it’s all live and in one take.’
