Peter Jones and Richard Farleigh offered Levi Roots £50,000 for Reggae Reggae Sauce on Dragon's Den.
The offer was made during Roots's 2007 pitch for his Caribbean-style sauce. In return for the money, the investors sought a 40 percent share of the business. The proposal became a landmark moment because the product later developed into a widely recognised commercial brand.
The amount is important because accounts of the pitch often mention both parts of the offer: the cash investment and the equity percentage. Separating those figures prevents a common error in which the 40 percent stake is mistakenly reported as the amount invested.
Roots's success after the programme also illustrates that a television deal is only one stage of building a business. Production capacity, supermarket distribution, packaging and marketing were all needed to turn a promising food product into a large retail operation.