Matt’s Business 2 Years Ahead of Schedule After Dragons’ Den Rejection

PETERBOROUGH, England - An entrepreneur says the growth of his businesses is nearly two years ahead of schedule, after he was spurred on by rejection in the Dragons’ Den.

Matt Wilson pitched for GBP45,000 for a 20 per cent stake of his www.freediscountcard.co.uk business in the online version of the popular TV show.

The video has just been released at www.bbc.co.uk/dragonsden.

Both online millionaire Dragons Shaf Rasul and Julie Meyer turned him down - and that inspired Matt to speed up his plans.

“I expected to reach this stage of my business in another two years,” he said.

“The day after my Dragon’s Den rejection was filmed, I did a massive deal with a customer loyalty company called V A C Media.

“It means that 500,000 cards will be in circulation by the summer. That will make freediscountcard.co.uk the UK’s biggest independent discount card scheme. And put my business years ahead of where I thought it would be in mid-2009.”

www.freediscountcard.co.uk is a unique scheme where businesses in every UK town and city offer a discount to shoppers who use the card while shopping.

Uniquely no-one pays for the card - neither businesses nor shoppers - making it perfect to encourage extra spending during the recession.

30,000 cards are already in circulation, with several thousand pounds a month saved by shoppers.

Matt covers the costs of running the www.freediscountcard.co.uk scheme with advertising and cashback deals on the website.

Online Dragon Shaf Rasul is worth GBP82 million, thanks to investments in property and computers.

Den colleague Julie Meyer heads an investment firm backed by entrepreneurs and has raised hundreds of millions of capital for start-ups.

Business can register and shoppers can get their card free of charge by visiting www.freediscountcard.co.uk.

Notes to editors

For any further information or interviews please contact Matt Wilson on +44-7779-667019, or email matt@freediscountcard.co.uk

Source: freediscountcard.co.uk

For any further information or interviews please contact Matt Wilson on +44-7779-667019, or email matt at freediscountcard.co.uk