Tycoon, more like typhoon

I'm going to talk about last night's airing of the Tycoon TV programme on ITV1 and the alcoholic fruit juice that one 'contestant' was trying to win this 'game' with.

For those of you who missed it, you may want to take a look at the Tycoon website you can even watch the whole episode again online (but I wouldn't recommend it). This is essentially a Tuesday (9pm) vehicle for Peter Jones to show us he's a whizz and can turn a group of people of mixed skills (I'm being polite here) into massive businesses whilst getting ITV to pay him to advertise the products on prime time TV (seems to be a poor and very commercial version of the Apprentice).

We did actually consider going on the show in February (I think it was about then) and looking back on it now I'm glad we didn't. Henry and I left our jobs to be independent and in control of what we were doing and work intensely on something we felt passionate about. These entrepreneurs have had to give up 49% of their company, been made to partake in sensationalist TV and worst of all unless they bow to the 'ideas' of Peter Jones he shuts down their companies. No thanks, Henry and I are doing this our way.

So, more about this perceived competition (I can't tell you the name of the product as that is a whole different issue that they are dragging through to the second week).... Elizabeth 'make things happen' Hackford (aged 35) is embarking on setting up a 'A natural fruit and alcoholic drink for women'. For those of you that want to enjoy (err I mean understand) more about her you may want to try this page Elizabeth on the tycoon website (the video of her is particularly fun) . She seems slightly clueless, and was the one on the back foot for almost the entire first show. Having said that, I'm going to try not to judge her, these programmes are deliberately confrontational. Showing what happens in 2 weeks of business for 6 companies in andhour is always going to lead to some aggressive editing to leave in the choice bits!

I feel that unlike Peter Jones (or even Elizabeth Hackford) we are slap bang in the middle of the target age range for our product (25 - 35 year old women) and have spent a lot of time thinking about the underlying concept. There are several reasons why our concept is different to that which she put forward:

• Juice versus cocktail - when people go out for a drink they don't want something styled on what they had for brekkie, rather a different taste designed for the 25-35 year old drinks market. People want something that has been crafted for when they go out to a pub/ bar. Just calling something premium doesn't make it so (particularly if it is alcoholic juice).
• Vodka flavours - Vodka and simple flavours . We are not ruling out producing a vodka based drink, but it will be because the vodka compliments the cocktail mix rather than it being the alcohol you can disguise the most easily...
• Juice versus cocktail (part 2) - we have blended our juices to come up with a truly great tasting product that fuses with the alcohol. A single juice and alcohol, where's the fun in that!
  
• Alcoholic content - Elizabeth is going to make this drink Alc 4% Vol and has stated that from the outset. We have taken months of taste trials and analysis of the market to fix on the 6.4% we have finalised on. In all of our taste trials people passionately wanted this alcoholic content, they just kept saying that they wanted to taste the enhancing properties of the alcohol. 4% and a single juice flavour all sounds very similar to Quinns that was launched last year and we understand to have not been a success
  
• NFC and watering down - Muddler is Not From Concentrate, but unlike the Tycoon beverage we are NOT watering down our product (as this kind of defies some of the points of being NFC). Unlike the alcoholic smoothie they mentioned on the programme our drink is also not the consistency of a smoothie. In our product the thinner nature of the cloudy apple juice is muddled with the thicker berries to produce the right consistency whilst being 100% fruit based.
• Muddler versus ??? - we have a name that we are proud of. It explains our product, is fun and just sounds right (you can truly imagine saying 'I'll have a Muddler please' across the bar). Peter Jones is trying to get Elizabeth to go for a controversial name (you know 'like Death cigarettes') that will get a lot of publicity. All this smacks of a quick buck, get out there, cause a stir and generate some quick money whilst everyone tries it. Then once people actually taste the product the rot sets in and people realise that it doesn't actually taste good and the name is a PR stunt.
  
• Character - we hope that our product (and Henry/ me as people) have a character that people will enjoy...
  

In summary, I'm once again happy that we are doing the right things and that the competition is obsessed with the facts that mixing alcohol with a natural product will be enough. We truly believe that this is naive ('I want to be the Innocent of the alcoholic drinks world' etc) and that people want more from their drinks experience. They want the complex but delicious tastes of Cocktails and secondary they want to be reassured that the product is 100% natural. In my eyes there is only one product ticking those boxes!

We were left on the cliffhanger of whether Elizabeth's company got wound up.... To spoil the 'fun', I simply don't think this is the case. It is all becoming clear that the film crews at the bottling plant (that resulted in some movement to our production slot) were almost definitely the product that the Tycoon show is trying to get on the market.

She says she could lose her flat if this goes wrong.... well I could lose our merchandise store room (aka my flat) if Muddler goes wrong. However, I truly don't believe that this is going to happen and rather than give 49% of our company to a man we don't think is the answer to everything (Peter Jones). We are going to do this our way.

For once I am going to leave you on a quote, from Elizabeth Hackford herself:
"Ruth Badger and Michelle Dewberry from The Apprentice are really highly regarded and get called in to do inspirational talks. I'll be doing that sooner or later."

If she wants...

personally I'll be trying to spread the message of Real Fruit Fruit Cocktails around the world.