Flavourly,
the gourmet food, snacks and craft beer subscription club that turned down four
investment offers from TV’s Dragons’ Den, has closed its campaign on Crowdcube,
having raised £515,000 through the crowd-funding platform.
The
total is 65 per cent over its £300k target (reached on 21 March) and has seen
339 investors take 34 per cent of the company’s equity. The sum is more than
six times larger than the £75,000 offered by the Dragons (for a 20 per cent
stake) on the programme broadcast in February. According to Crowdcube, Flavourly
is the first ever Scottish
company to raise more than £500,000 through a crowd-fund.
Flavourly
is the brainchild of 26-year-old Scottish entrepreneur Ryan O’Rorke. Having seen his father, an amateur
honey maker, struggle to sell products outside his local circle, O’Rorke found
75 per cent of small British producers do not have the resources or
infrastructure to sell direct to consumers or to the multiples.
Flavourly selects the finest
independently-produced gourmet food, snacks and craft beer and delivers them in
a package to customers each month. Popular products include bacon jam, chilli
popcorn and venison, mushroom and whisky pasta sauce.
O’Rorke launched Flavourly in
November 2012 from his grandmother’s garage in Edinburgh. Since then the
company has grown 500 per cent year on year, shipping more than 500,000
products from over 300 small British producers. Its craft beer club was
launched in 2014 and received 4,000 orders on the first day.
On
Dragons’ Den, O’Rorke was seen pitching for £75,000 and received four separate investment
offers, plus a job offer from Kelly Hoppen. Viewers saw O’Rorke accept a joint bid
from Piers Linney and Peter Jones in exchange for a 20 per cent stake of the
business.
However,
following the show’s recording, O’Rorke and Flavourly CEO Assean Sheikh decided to decline the Dragons’ offer and pursue
other investment opportunities. Since Dragons’
Den aired, Flavourly has gained thousands of new subscribers and sales have
increased tenfold. They are expected to reach £1m this year.
Says
Ryan O’Rorke: ‘We’ve always believed in the strength our product but to have
exceeded our target in such a dramatic way is truly amazing. We warmly welcome
all our new investors and have huge and exciting growth plans to make Flavourly the go-to destination for gourmet
food, snacks and craft beer across Europe.’
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